Watching the Watchers
by SJlikeslists
Summary: Madge and Gale had to watch their friend go off to the Hunger Games. Their parents had to watch them.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I don't wake up in the morning. Waking would imply that sleeping had occurred, and it had not. I don't sleep on the night before the Reaping. I have not since my first baby reached his twelfth year. I keep vigil on the night before the day when he might be taken from me by something beyond my ability to control. I let the darkness and the quiet sound of my family's breathing be the only witnesses to the fears that I do not let them see in the light of day. This is the seventh year that I have kept this watch, and it will be the last time that I do so for him. Next year, his brother will take his place as the focus of my vigil (then my baby boy and finally my only girl). By the time they have all gotten beyond the reach of this particular threat, I may have a brief respite before I keep vigil for another generation. I may not. I may not be here to keep my vigil. I don't dwell on the thought, but I have no illusions about the reality of life in District 12.

The focus of my worries on this day is already gone from the house before I detach Posy's arms from around my own and move to cobble together breakfast for my little ones. He thinks he slipped out without anyone noticing. He thinks he wakes before us all. On a normal day, he might be right. Not today. He often slips out of the house before his siblings are up. He never wakes me to tell me that he is going. I don't ask him to. He lives and breathes for his brothers and sister. Their welfare should not have been his burden, but it is. He chooses them every day of his life. If the privacy of unquestioned mornings are all he asks in return, that is the least that I can give him. He doesn't need to tell me where he is going anyway. I always know. He is in his woods. I should refer to them as the woods, but that preposition hasn't set correctly in my head for nearly four years now. The woods are his. They are his refuge. His place. His means of being who he is. This should make me worry. The woods are, after all, off limits to those of us who live within the confines of District 12. For our own safety, of course. The Capital is awfully concerned about keeping us safe from all those things that dwell within the woods.

Gale in the woods is not on the list of things which make me worry. I can remember a time when the thought of a child of mine chancing such a thing would have been cause for far more than mere worry. I can remember a time when rules were strictly enforced and punishments were swift and severe. This time is lax. The Peacekeepers themselves care more for what my child can bring them than they do about the laws he breaks to get it to them. There are dangers, but they are minor in comparison to other threats my children face. I am happy that Gale has something that is his.

He left earlier than usual today. He will be looking for something to trade. He will want to make this day special. It lays on him – those forty-two slips of paper on which his name is written, the twenty bearing _hers_, even the one belonging to her sister. He doesn't say it to me; I can only hope he says it to her. He knows, even if he never admits it out loud, that even one is too many. She will be meeting him in his woods. He can talk there. He can say the things which he holds in too tightly while within the confines of the fence that marks the boundaries of our home. I know he does by the way he comes home from days with her less tense, less wound, as if some of the heaviness that rests upon his shoulders has lifted for a bit. I am happy that he has her. She makes him feel less alone. He was suspicious of her at first; I suspect she was equally so of him. She's hard to read sometimes – that Katniss Everdeen.

In whatever way it happened, the two have bonded now. They share the burden of oldest children thrust too early into too much responsibility for younger siblings. They both make the little ones their world. I worry, sometimes, if either one or both of them will someday learn to resent their missed childhoods. I have to remind myself that, in this place, we all have our worries far younger than we should.

I remember waiting for the Reaping each year. I remember the way the tally of your entries would replay through your head as the days counted downward. I remember the guilty start that took you over for each of seven years when you realized the first emotion that registered each time the name was not your own was relief and not sympathy. The children of the Districts know what it is to know that life can be short. They see hunger, they see accidents, and they see the Games. You grow up thinking that you know what worry is. Then, you have children of your own.

You learn what worry really means. So, I keep my vigil. Each year, from now until perhaps the rest of my life, I will keep watch through the night into the early hours of the morning. It accomplishes nothing of practical purpose. It won't spare my children's inclusion. It won't guarantee their safety. It won't end the way things are. I do it anyway. It is my acknowledgement that the day isn't normal. It is my reminder that this day is not the way that things should be. It's foolish. It's even wasteful (who doesn't take advantage of the opportunity to sleep when they can). I won't make myself stop. I need my ritual of this night the way my Gale needs his woods.

When he arrives home, he isn't calm. Something has nettled him. I suspect I know what it is when I see that he has brought back strawberries. On this day with his nerves raw, he is willing to take offense at nearly anything. It's a habit his father had – the wanting to pick a fight to make himself feel better. Either the Undersee girl didn't take the bait, or Katniss shushed him before he could get going. I'm pleased. He should know better. He should know to save it for his woods. On any other day, he does.

Despite his poor mood, everyone is fed and clean and dressed and ready to leave in a timely manner. We walk to the square, and Gale leaves us to check himself in with the Peacekeepers. I usher the children to a place close to the front beside the rope dividers. It makes me feel less at a loss if I can see him clearly. During the reading of our history, I watch my son. He is doing his best to look above it all, but I know him well. I see the smile he gives Posy when she catches his eye. At four, she doesn't understand yet what is happening, and he wants to keep it that way. I see the reassuring look he sends over his shoulder at Prim. This is her first year, and she looks frightened. I know that same look meant to instill confidence will appear next year directed at Rory on his first Reaping Day.

There is some commotion involving the arrival of our only living victor, but I don't pay it any mind. Everyone is District 12 knows what to expect from Haymitch Abernathy. I, instead, watch as Gale shakes his head and with a single look quells his brothers into staring abashedly at the ground (they were kicking at each other's ankles). I watch him look back into the group of 16s and make eye contact with Katniss. His face is turned away from me, and I cannot see his expression. I see hers though, as he turns back to the front, and I know he wasn't able to muster up the reassurance he found for Prim. There is a reason my boy has nearly all acquaintances instead of friends. Once he has let someone in, he thinks that he's responsible for them. On most days, I still can't decide whether I believe it's his best trait or his worst.

The woman from the Capital is calling out the first name, and my heart breaks a little in response. Some for the girl, some for the family, but mostly for my son who I know will take this badly. The girl that is called is Primrose Everdeen.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

The first aspect of the name that Effie Trinket reads to register in my brain is that it is not, in fact, my daughter's. It may sound self-centered and uncaring, but I defy any parent of a Reaping age child to claim that their thoughts flow differently. I would call them a liar to their face, but I'm supposed to display more diplomacy – it's an occupational hazard. I find Madge's face in the crowd, but she isn't looking toward the little blond haired girl beginning to make her way toward the front. She is, instead, looking in her own section. She's staring, in fact, at a dark haired girl whose eyes have glazed over. Madge looks like she's waiting for something. It's then that the name registers. Everdeen.

The little girl (a twelve by the look of her and the restless murmuring of the crowd) must be the little sister of my daughter's friend. I knew there was a younger sister. I've heard Madge mention it in the wistful tone of voice she always falls into when she talks of people with siblings. It's the closest to complaining that she ever comes (when she's speaking to me anyway). I might suspect that she does her complaining to her friends, but she doesn't seem to have any – except for Katniss Everdeen. My heart twists for the heart scalding my daughter is about to experience. The one plus of my daughter's rather solitary existence is that she has, thus far, been spared the firsthand experience of watching someone she really knows going into the Games (she's had enough second hand experience to make up for it by leaps and bounds, but that isn't relevant to the moment).

Madge is still watching her friend's face with that expectant expression when the girl charges forward and pushes her sister behind her while calling out that she volunteers. I'm surprised. Madge is not. Her eyes drift closed and she bites her lip. It isn't shock that she's conveying; it's resignation. She knew. She fully expected her friend to come rushing to her sister's rescue when no one in this District has bothered since long before she was born. My mind drifts back to the joyful expression on my daughter's face when she came home one day bursting to inform me that Katniss had let her sit with her at lunch and hadn't minded at all. I had thought it was relief after nearly two months of trying to find where she fit in the upper school social hierarchy (a difficult place for a naturally quiet girl to navigate after years of lower school teachers directing your seating charts and project partners). I think, now, that perhaps my daughter is a better judge of character than I realized.

That's not going to do her any favors in this situation. She's not going to lose someone she knows tangentially to the Games. She's going to lose the only friend she has.

Effie Trinket is blathering on about protocol, and I find myself cutting her off short. I don't think I've ever done that before. No one cares about the proper format for processing volunteers. It doesn't matter. None of the rusty and unremembered steps for drawing out the show matter. We all know how this is going to end, and there is no need to put that crying little girl clinging to her sister through any more of a public spectacle. Besides, those regulations are for different circumstances. They are for those caught up in playing the Capital's game the way it likes it to be played. There is no place for that here in the face of the self-sacrifice we are witnessing.

The boy I've seen accompanying her when she delivers strawberries to Madge at the back door pulls the little girl away, and Katniss climbs the podium. Effie Trinket looks pleased as punch over the development, so maybe she will forget to get her feathers ruffled over the "incivility" of my earlier interruption. I can only hope.

My day of being surprised has not come to an end. The crowd does not give their usual token (if admittedly half-hearted) applause. Silence descends on the square for one brief moment. I didn't know District 12 still had it in them. I meet Madge's eyes again and notice that she (along with the rest of the population) is giving Katniss a traditional salute. I can only hope that the Capital commentators decide that it is some backwards tradition that isn't worth noting.

Haymitch decides to interject himself into the proceedings at this point by openly taunting the Capital before taking a dive off the front of the stage. He can play his drunken victor card and get away with it. The rest of us have no such protection. I can't decide if he thinks he was helping or just couldn't resist the opportunity. I can't decide if all of 12 are actively attempting to bring the Capital's attention back on us full force, or if I am merely being paranoid.

Things have gotten so much better. It took so long for us to get back to this place. I steal a glance at the girl standing on this stage who I know good and well would have starved to death in the District 12 that existed after the last time the Capital turned its attention in our direction. I look back at my daughter who is smiling softly after what she must see as a display of District unity directed at her friend. She doesn't know how deeply District unity (or any kind of unity for that matter) is frowned upon. She has no way to know what it was like because I have never told her. I don't want her to see how much harsher life in this place can be. Please, please don't let her ever see just how difficult our lives can be made.

The boy's name is drawn. Somewhere it registers that it is one of the baker's sons – the youngest, I think he's a classmate of Madge's. I'm focused back on the task at hand. Reading the Treaty is next. I get through it, as I do every year, reading without focusing on the words. My mind is occupied, as it always has been, with thoughts of my little girl. I look at her standing in the crowd, eyes a little watery, fingers tracing the pin on her shoulder. I think about her and what she means to me and know that I will never, ever understand what it was that possessed our predecessors to sign the piece of paper that I am reading. How beaten down and dead inside do you have to be in order to sign away your children's future?


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

The crowd usually disperses quickly after the tributes are hustled away by the Peacekeepers. Most don't want to look at the families who have just lost their children. It sounds callous, but it is actually some of the best manners that District 12 displays. You don't want to shove your relief that it wasn't one of yours in their faces. For the families and a few particularly close friends, this is the time to make your way into the Justice Building and figure out how to say good-bye. I have never had to do this. I don't know where you would start such a conversation. Gale is about to find out. The minute the crowd was able to move he was in motion. I edge the little ones through the dispersing crowd (it may be my imagination, but it seems to be lingering longer this year) and settle them on the steps leading to the front doors of the Justice Building. Gale should emerge here when he is finished. He will want to be alone with his thoughts. I know that this is one time that I cannot let him have that privacy. He's going to need the reminder that his brothers and sister will provide him with – that others love him, that he's not alone, that he can't do something stupid.

He'll be in there now standing in line behind Katniss's mother and sister. Poor Prim. That child may be the most sensitive one I have ever encountered. She's not going to get over this. And their mother . . . I, for the first time ever, find myself feeling sorry for Ari Everdeen.

She and I aren't cut from the same cloth – and it isn't because we were raised on opposite sides of the District. Eight men were lost in the mine the day I lost my husband. Two were boys recently out of school. One was an older man who had never married. Five of them left wives behind. Three of those left children. There were five of us (or three depending on how you looked at it) who might have understood what we were going through. We had a built in group of people that we might have been able to talk to about the things that burdened us. It didn't work out that way. Maybe it's best that it didn't. I know I had enough to be getting on with. Maybe knowing the other's worries better would have just made everything harder all around.

The newly widowed mother of one had a toasting to a widower with two little ones of his own within two months of the accident. I didn't know her. I don't know why she chose him, but she took care of her little boy. I can respect that. One of the widows without any children moved back home with her parents. That seemed to me to be a sensible thing to do. The other had a baby on the way. She went into hysterics at the mine that day. No one could calm her down. She miscarried and died when the bleeding wouldn't stop. I don't understand her.

Mostly, I don't understand Ari Everdeen who had two children who had just lost their father and desperately needed her. I didn't know them, so I didn't know what was going on at the time. I don't think that anyone did. Katniss hid things too well. If any of the neighbors were suspicious, they wouldn't have said anything anyway. People like to mind their own business, and no one likes to send children to the Community Home if they can help it. What I've pieced together over the past couple of years is that that woman sat there lost in her grief and left her little girls to fend for themselves. I can't respect that.

So, despite the camaraderie amongst our children (Prim loves to fuss over Posy, and Posy loves to be fussed over), the two of us are nodding acquaintances at best. She's good at healing. She'll always be my first choice for my sick or injured children (I just regret that she didn't decide to start employing those skills earlier), but we don't socialize. Today, though, I have nothing but sympathy for her. She's had one child spared at the cost of another. I don't know how one even begins to sort that out. Does something like that ever get sorted, or does it haunt you every time you see the child you still have?

I redirect my thoughts to my current predicament. Gale. He'll be coming out any minute looking like a thundercloud and wanting to tear into the world. My son hates change. Changes in prices mean his careful plans for the care of his siblings have to be revised. Changes in age mean that they are that much closer to the Reaping. Change is a father who never comes home from the mines and leaves him to be the man in the little one's world. This is how he looks at the world. He masters the way things are at the moment, learns to navigate it, and fights tooth and nail against anything that forces him to have to start the process over. It's his way of exercising control. It's his way of protecting everything that he views as his.

Katniss's entrance into his life was once one of those things against which he fought tooth and nail. She was a variable. She was unexpected. She was outside his narrow focus. But, he learned to let her in (and Prim came along for the ride). Now, the two of them come under the heading of _his_ – the way in which he classifies all people for whom he believes himself responsible. Her exit from his life will be hard for him – not just for the obvious reasons, but because he will consider it a failure on his part that he didn't do something to stop it. There was nothing he could do in this case, but that won't matter to him in the mood in which he is likely to be.

I won't blame him for being angry. How could he not be when he is being asked to say good-bye before having to wait to watch her die? I know that theory states that each child has an equal chance of coming home, but I'm a practical woman. No one actually believes that they all have equal chances. She might have an edge over others who have gone from District 12, but that doesn't change the fact that the odds are against her. Besides, I don't forget easily even if others in this District do. I remember what happened to the Abernathys after the last Quarter Quell. I remember that Haymitch Abernathy doesn't drink just because he can afford to. The girl who shares his woods with my son isn't coming back. He can be as angry as he likes. He just needs to be careful how and where he lets that anger out.

The Everdeens emerge being followed by a camera carrying man with green hair. Posy tries to escape toward Prim, but I deflect her. She sighs with disappointment as they disappear around a corner. Rory and Vick are being surprisingly calm about their protracted stay on the steps. They understand what is going on. Posy doesn't and is getting increasingly restless.

I pick her up and distract her with one of her favorite stories whispered in her ear. While I am focused on her, Vick has struck up a conversation with the Undersee girl. Her house is one of his laundry deliveries.

"He was after me in line," she offers when she looks up and meets my eyes. She waves good-bye to Vick and walks off in the direction of her house. He hollers a good-bye after her in return. Madge. Her name is Madge. Gale has never used her first name in my hearing, but she and Vick are obviously on a first name basis. I'll think about that later.

Gale makes his appearance looking for all the world like he is ready to bolt for the nearest weak spot in the fence. Then, he sees us. He sends me a disapproving look which I return in kind. I'm the mother here. His face softens as Posy escapes me and wraps herself around his legs. He scoops her up and buries his face for a moment in her hair.

"Let's go home."


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I'm not certain what I should expect when I finally make it home. Effie Trinket leaves with the tributes, but the camera crews have to pack up all of their equipment. Reporters get "initial reaction" statements from the families. All of this takes time. The swarm of people from the Capital doesn't leave until late evening, and I am expected to be available in my office (in case of questions) until they do. Never once, in all my years as mayor, have any of them asked me any questions that didn't relate to the purchase of "quaint District souvenirs." I have, however, received multiple complaints over the years about the lack of fresh seafood available on their refreshment table. Geography is apparently every bit as much of a woefully under taught skill in the Capital as it is in District 12.

When their train has finally pulled out of the station, I decide to start mentally preparing myself to comfort a crying teenager. It will be a new experience for me. I haven't dealt with a crying daughter since Madge was still small enough to be scooped up and placed on the counter to have her scraped knees cleaned. It was a nice feeling, one of accomplishment as a father, that I could make the tears stop with a few soothing words and a little dabbing with a cloth soaked in water. I doubt that anything that simple will suffice on this occasion.

I expect there to be crying tonight because the loss of your best friend seems to me a crying kind of occasion. Tears are what I would have expected from her mother back before . . . There is no use letting my thoughts dwell there. It's a pointless exercise, and Madge isn't her mother (no matter how much she looks like her all over again). Still, tears are the normal teenage girl reaction to upsetting events, aren't they? Suffice it to say that I have geared up to deal patiently with tears, and I am somewhat thrown not to find any. Madge is seated in the kitchen with a cup of tea waiting for me.

"I heard the train leave," she explains. "I knew you would be here soon."

Well, huh, now what? I'm still bracing myself for a teary eyed storm – looking forward to it really, I have a plan for that. I'm not sure what to do with this calmness. It's eerie. I know how much finally having someone who made her feel welcome meant to my daughter. It's one of my regrets as a parent – knowing that her solitariness is mostly my fault. My job separates her from the rest of the children of the District. There is a certain amount of distrust that comes with the position of mayor. Even though I grew up here just like the rest of them, I am associated with the Capital by many. It isn't overt. It is certainly never spoken out loud, but you can hear the strain in the conversations of those around you. There's a certain amount of hesitancy as if people are choosing their words extra carefully. The guardedness sort of drifts into the younger generation, and they often apply it to Madge without really realizing (at least, I hope it isn't intentional, the only other mayor in my memory didn't have children, so I don't have a basis for comparison).

There tends to be some Seam/Town segregation amongst the children of the District. It isn't an insurmountable breach, but the teachers in the lower school foster it in the way they divide the children up. Part of the problem is that Madge is every bit as separated from the Town kids as well. They have all been working in various capacities in their parent's shops for as long as they can remember. Madge has been practicing her piano (and washing dishes, but I doubt many of the children in 12 would believe that). It skews their common topics of conversation into a venue where Madge can't exactly follow. When you add in the fact that she is naturally quiet with a serious bent to her personality, things like fitting in with gossipy teenage girls just doesn't seem to come easily for her.

It might have been better for her if she hadn't been an only child. She would have, at least, had an ally. It's unfortunate that that wasn't a possibility.

The point of all my meandering thoughts being this – I know exactly what Katniss's acceptance meant to her. I know how much it must be hurting her to lose her, and she is showing no outward sign that anything is wrong. It's . . . disquieting. Perhaps she did her crying before I got here? She doesn't look like she's been crying. Maybe she thinks I can't handle her crying and is trying to be stoic for my benefit? I can handle it. I'm a dad. Comforting is part of the job description. (Fixing is part of the job description too, but I can't fix this for her.) I decide to offer an opening, so she will know that I'm prepared to listen.

"I'm sorry about your friend," I tell her. "I know how much you're going to miss her."

She doesn't respond. She looks at me as if searching for the answer to some question that I was unaware that she had asked. She blinks, and her expression crosses into something that I find myself unable to identify.

"You think she's not coming back." She says as if it's a thought that hasn't occurred to her before.

"Honey . . ." I begin, but I don't have to find the words to finish the sentence. It's just as well. I'm not sure what I was going to say. She's taken me by surprise again. She's normally such a practical, reasonable girl.

She stands up and kisses me on the forehead while I'm still trying to find my bearings again.

"Daddy, just wait and see." She says and leaves the room without another word or glance.


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

No one is required to be in the square to view the showing of the tribute parade. It is, technically, mandatory television viewing (just like all aspects of the Games are), but the parade is something that we are "trusted" to watch in our own homes. At least in District 12, the parade isn't important enough to have the Peacekeepers provide oversight. They don't seem to care enough to go to the trouble. After all, the parade isn't for the people in the Districts. The parade exists for the audience in the Capital. This post stylist "first glimpse" of the children factors into sponsorships (and the rampant betting that is never officially mentioned yet everyone seems to know about anyway – even in 12).

Gale is looking progressively tenser as I dry the dishes from supper. I think that this must be an awkward emotional time to navigate. He must be looking forward to seeing a glimpse of Katniss, but he also knows that the tribute parade is really nothing to look forward to. I don't know how to make this easier for him. It's not as if he is going to voluntarily confide in me about his emotions. He would also resist most of my approaches at this point. He thinks he doesn't need to be comforted. He is far too used to being the comforter. I do the only thing that I think may help which is to send Posy over as sneakily as I can to ask him to play with her as he becomes increasingly more restless.

Posy is an effective distraction. I knew she would be. Gale doesn't have the heart to turn down his little sister's pleading eyes –not when it is something that he can give her that only inconveniences him. I feel no regret that I am willing to shamelessly use my knowledge of his weakness in this manner – it's part of parenting an adolescent who has done far too much parenting himself. He might as well focus on something else anyway. There is nothing he can do but wait for now. The electricity we always receive for the Games has trapped him within the fence. He can't leave the house. They may not put too much emphasis on the mandatory viewing this evening, but something as blatant as wandering the District when one is supposed to be home would be noticed and punished.

There is no need for us to pay attention to the time. The television turns itself on when the programming begins. Every other television in the District will do the same. Mandatory does, after all, mean mandatory. I brace myself for what is about to start. I have years upon years of experience viewing this event – the truth is that nothing ever really stands out. Districts 1 and 2 are always varying degrees of glitzy. District 4 has years where the costumes are cleverer than others, and everyone else blends into dullness. Tribute blends into tribute. Year blends into years. The harsh truth is that they are simply a long line of children (part of an even longer line of children stretching back through the years) that will soon be dead. I should be saddened by it all. I should be infuriated. I am neither. Sadness won't fix it. Fury won't change it. That's part of why we have to watch. They want us to be numb. They want us to accept. I'm a practical woman, and I have my own line of children to worry over.

Even the people of District 12 have lost interest by the time the District 12 tributes are shown. In a typical year, the ever used mockery of a coal miner's jumpsuit isn't enough to bring back anyone's focus. One year, the poor humiliated children were paraded around naked – as if it wasn't enough to demand their deaths. This year, I hope for the uninteresting jumpsuits. My family doesn't need to see Katniss in the other option. My son doesn't need another reason to be angry.

This is not a typical year.

They are dazzling. That is not a word that I have ever found a use for before. It is the only word that comes to my mind now. The flames lap at them without consuming. It's beautiful somehow. There is something powerful and poetic about it and words of poetry whispered by my grandmother when I was small are suddenly called to my mind. I'm not sure why. It should be frightening, but it isn't. It's mesmerizing. The stylists have accomplished something that hasn't been done in my memory (probably ever). They have pulled everyone's attention back to the two children in the chariot. They have made District 12 riveting. It will be nearly impossible for anyone to look away. I do.

I look at my son. He is clearly dazzled. He isn't looking away. Posy is oohing and ahing. Rory and Vick are nudging each other and whispering. Gale hears none of it. He is staring in what I first take to be awe. Then, I notice that his jaw is clenched, and his nails are digging into his palms. I look back to the screen to determine what is causing this reaction. He wants her to come home. He should be pleased that sponsors will be taking notice.

Katniss is smiling at the crowd. I don't believe I have ever seen her smile. I have seen her look less severe. I have seen a sort of softness displayed in her eyes when she looks at her sister. I have never seen a smile. She begins to blow kisses at the crowd. They eat it up. They are clearly enamored with this girl with the flames who is playing up to them so charmingly. I wonder if that is why Gale looks so tense. It isn't her personality she is displaying. She is buried somewhere underneath this creation of Capital stylists. I wonder if it is striking him that the girl he knew is gone.

During the speech and the anthem, Gale's eyes never leave the screen. He blinks only in those brief moments when the cameras actually move away from the District 12 chariot. It is as the music dies away that I realize what it is that he is staring at so intently. Katniss and the baker's boy are holding hands.

I don't get to ask questions. In that moment, the electricity goes off with a pop. He's out the door before the echo dies from my ears.


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

Does it mark me a coward if I admit that I feel only relief at the lack of interaction between myself and my daughter in the days following the Reaping? It is not as if I have been avoiding her. We have simply returned to the normal pacing of our days. She goes to school. I go to work. It is often late enough that she is already asleep before I return home. It was entirely accidental that I was still at the Justice Building when the tribute parade aired. I am not avoiding my daughter. It's just the way things are. I will, however, admit that it is incredibly convenient given the fact that I have yet to determine the most effective manner for dealing with her sudden departure from her normal, dependable insistence upon practicality. She has to know. She has to know that her friend is gone. She does know, so why is she clinging to the notion that things can be otherwise?

We had a new dress made for the Reaping this year. I was told that last year's no longer fit. That happens with children – they grow. Being her father, I tried very hard to not pay attention to the fact that the reason her old "good" dress no longer fit wasn't entirely just because she had gotten taller.

The last dress had been pink with a bow. It still seemed appropriate when it was purchased for her at fourteen. It made its appearance on Reaping days and on those occasions when my family was required to host visitors from the Capital (which was any occasion when there were visitors from the Capital). We may be District 12, but we aren't entirely free from scrutiny. There are mine inspections from time to time and periodic visits from minor bureaucrats checking up on our record keeping. For two years, my little girl looked very much like a little girl in her pink dress with the bow. The visitors to our home saw the dress, mentally processed "child," and ignored her presence. That is my preferred mode of interaction between them and my Madge.

Only now it didn't fit. I could reconcile myself to that. I'm not that disconnected to the ways of teenage girls that I didn't know that bows would probably be too much to hope for this time around. We were in her mother's room when the topic was broached (Madge always tries to include her whenever she is well enough to pay attention). I was already mentally processing an order for pink fabric when my wife asked a question that it never would have occurred to me to have asked.

"What color would you like?" Madge's dress for such occasions has always been pink – always. I was prepared to gloss over my wife's apparent forgetfulness over her child's favorite color when Madge answered.

"I think it should be white."

"White?" I questioned certain that I had misheard.

"Yes, I don't think I'll be getting any taller now." She replied.

That answer made no sense to me, but my wife was nodding her agreement. Then, I caught the way that Madge's eyes momentarily flickered toward the drawer where we keep her mother's medication – the medication that we had nearly doubled our consumption of over the past few weeks as my wife had taken another turn for the worse.

I knew then just how infinitely steeped in practicality my daughter was. She was choosing white in the coal district – which to an outsider would sound like the decision of one who wasn't thinking much at all. But, she knew she wasn't getting any taller. She was choosing one white dress. Three more Reaping days, any and all hostessing in our home, and her wedding dress all covered in one purchase (it would, after all, reflect badly if the mayor's child rented such an item). It's even an investment of sorts, because a white dress has a value all of its own in 12. It can be resold to the shop where most of the women here do rent their wedding dresses.

It was the kind of practicality that hits a father right in the gut. She shouldn't be thinking like that. She shouldn't be worried about the cost of her mother's medication. She shouldn't be trying to amend my budget for me. Those are my responsibilities. They aren't hers to carry. She carries enough already. I opened my mouth to object. My wife, who was having her first lucid day in a week, placed her hand over my own and slowly shook her head.

"Let her," she mouthed to me.

So, we've changed from pink dresses to white. My little girl took her stand as someone who could make adult decisions. My wife says it's important to let her do that. I tried to point out that the morphling isn't the area of concern that she thinks it is, but she responded that we can't exactly explain that to Madge. It would invite more questions than we are allowed to answer for her. Besides, she told me that the two of them had talked about it before. She says it isn't really about the morphling (although Madge does worry), our daughter just doesn't see a reason to purchase any more dresses when one will do. She told my wife it was wasteful. So, I let my practical daughter be practical.

That's why I don't understand her stance on Katniss. My child who has never complained about having to sit with her mother when she could have been playing with the others, who hides her distaste for the yearly invaders of her home with a grace that would make Snow's cabinet proud, who always accepts everything that is thrown at her with realism and moving forward is somehow stuck in fantasy on this point. It's maddening. I didn't want her to lose her friend. It's just what life has thrown at her. I don't want her to be crushed. The longer she holds out hope, the more crushed she is going to be. I've never had to reason with her before because she's never seemed to need reasoning with. It's bizarre. It's like she knows something about the situation that I'm not seeing, but I know that it is the other way around. I'm the one who knows things she doesn't know.

I might be able to access the situation more clearly if when I sat down to think something other than the debacle of that tribute parade would come into my thoughts. Those stylists were insane. Don't they know that District 12 is supposed to be invisible? We need to keep it that way.

I make it home the earliest I've been in days, and I find Madge curled up in my office glued to a replay of the parade. She looks so hopefully excited that I can't stand to look, and I most definitely can't stand to watch that giant sign screaming "Look at District 12!" again. So, I remind her that my office isn't a place that she is supposed to be. She rolls her eyes thinking I'm kidding. I've said as much before in a teasing manner, but we both know the truth is that she isn't supposed to be in this room. I've just never enforced the policy. I repeat myself, and she looks at me in confusion before a noise from her mother's room sends her scurrying to check on her.

And I am a coward because all I can think is "saved."


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

Posy prattles. It's to be expected. She is four, after all. She doesn't understand what is going on; she only knows that her brother is sad. Gale is her hero. He's the only concept of a father that she has. If things are not right in Gale's world, then things are not right in hers. And she sets out to fix it in the only way that her four year old self knows how to tackle the problem. When she is sad, someone hugs her. When she is sad, her family tells her stories to make her happy. So, she latches onto Gale whenever he is in the house. She sits in his lap when he sits. She clings to his leg when he walks. And she talks. She talks about Katniss.

It makes sense to her. Gale is sad. Gale likes Katniss. She will tell him about Katniss, and he will be happy. If only everything made as much sense as the mind of a four year old girl. She has seemingly forgotten that Gale was present when we all saw Katniss on the screen of the television, or maybe she has decided that it doesn't matter that he was there. It's all she says – variations on the theme of Katniss in the fire. Katniss had horses – she had forgotten that she had seen them before, but Vick had told her their name. Katniss's horses were black like the sky when it gets dark. They were pulling Katniss in a wagon (and maybe she could go for a ride in Prim's wagon later). Katniss had a fire, and it was pretty. But he shouldn't worry because Katniss didn't get burn–ed up because it wasn't the right kind of fire for that. It really was Katniss even though it didn't look like Katniss because Katniss on the television looked nicer than Katniss not on the television but it really was her. Rory said it was. And everybody on the television really liked Katniss. You could tell because they clapped their hands and yelled her name. But Gale shouldn't worry because they weren't yelling like when the lady next door yelled at her kids when they did something bad. Katniss didn't do anything bad. The people were just yelling 'cause they were excited that Katniss looked so pretty with the fire that you could touch on her clothes. And he didn't even have to worry about Katniss falling out of the wagon like she did that one time when Rory pulled her too fast and it tipped over because that boy with the yellow hair was holding her hand to make sure she didn't fall over just like Momma holds her hand when they go to town because sometimes the rocks make her trip.

If it had been Rory, he would have slapped him upside the head and told him to do his chores. If it had been Vick, he would have glared him into silence and told him to do his chores. It's Posy, so he endures it for as long as he can and finds an excuse to leave the house. I don't stop him. I'm actually amazed at his composure. The truth is that I can't get her to stop talking either. This is the first time that I've realized how much my oldest and youngest children share in their personalities. Posy is being so Gale in her determination that if it were under any other circumstances it would be amusing. Gale is _hers_, and something is wrong. She will be the one to fix it. Nothing distracts her. No one can reason with her. It's exhausting.

Other than Posy's sudden single minded determination, things are relatively calm. Gale is gone early in the morning. I know that he is leaving a portion of what he brings from the woods with the Everdeens. I suspect that Katniss would have done the same for us if the situations were reversed. I think they had some sort of a deal. I think I would have been okay with that. I know I wouldn't have stopped her even if I wasn't. I wouldn't have wanted to interfere with that last attempt on my son's part to take care of his siblings. I shudder just thinking the thought. It doesn't feel real sometimes that Gale is safe from the Reaping. Maybe I'll really feel it sink in after I see how he recovers from what the Reaping has taken from him anyway.

He's back in time to walk to school with his brothers even though it is very clear that he doesn't want to be. That is an argument that we have already had. He will finish out the school year. He doesn't have to. You are an adult in District 12 the minute your eighteenth year Reaping in over. You can quit school. You can start a job. Many children begin in the mines the minute that they can. Most don't see the reason to finish those last few weeks of school. Completion isn't necessary. It isn't required. The mines will take you just the same.

Gale won't talk to me about how he feels about the mines. He likely won't admit it to himself. I see all the same. They are the place where his father died. They are a place where he will be enclosed, trapped even more than he already is by the realities of 12. All he will admit to seeing is the paycheck. I won't lie and pretend that we don't need it. I won't act like I'm not counting on that paycheck just as much as he is. Rory is 12 soon. That paycheck is something that Gale sees as standing between his brother and tesserae. I know that, but Gale has sacrificed for us for years. School is one point where I stand firm that the sacrifice ends.

The mines will take you without finishing, but that isn't the only point to be considered. Working down in the mines doesn't have to be the end of the line. The coal doesn't just have to be picked out of the rock. There are other positions – there are those who direct the shifts of workers, those who keep the records, those who load the trains. Any promotion to such a position requires an impeccable record as an entry level mine worker, and it requires you to have a completion certificate from finishing your final year at school.

Gale will have that option. I won the battle over whether the few weeks of extra paychecks to be gained were worth it. They aren't. We'll be fine. We'll get by a little longer. The school year officially ends the day after the Games do. There is a two week break before classes resume (idleness isn't encouraged in 12). Gale wants to be in the mines now. He won't be until the Games end. I'm thinking about his future even if he is not. If it happens to give me the additional comfort of knowing that my son will get through this difficult time of having his friend in the Games being able to be up in the sunlight instead of shut up in the ground, I'll take it. This battle had already been fought between us, but it gives me one more reason to know I made the right decision.

He goes to the woods; he goes to school. It would almost be normal if it weren't so painfully not. Rory tails him home from school begging to be taken along to the woods the next morning. Gale always tells him no. Vick gets home later than they do. He walks with Prim and Madge. He has enough sense to not mention that in front of his brother. I'm not the only one Gale has ever lost a battle to. It has been over two years since he lost that one. Katniss had gotten rabbit fever. Gale had been sixteen, so she must have been fourteen at the time. He had drug his brothers off to pick Prim up on their way to school that morning and came home that afternoon muttering under his breath about meddling and people who didn't know their place. I don't know exactly what happened. Rory refused to say and Vick just burst into giggles when I asked. I didn't press much. It didn't matter to me if the mayor's daughter walked Prim back and forth to school.

We could almost pretend that Katniss is just sick again – Gale going off to the woods on his own and Prim getting walked by Madge. If only it were that, I would know that my son would get over his moodiness and recover. This is so much bigger than that, and I don't know when or even if he will. He wouldn't be the first to be broken by the Games. I don't know how to protect him from that.

Somewhere in the Capital, the children are in training to begin the Games. Here in 12, my child is waiting for what they will bring.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

Silence is not an unusual state of being in the Undersee household. We aren't a naturally boisterous group. My wife, Madge, and myself aren't people who raise their voices. We aren't people who have noisy pursuits. Even Madge's piano practice takes place in a muted sort of tone with softly touched keys providing a sort of calm, quiet background music to our lives. The Capital provided staff (one housekeeper/cook and one gardener/handyman) that look after the property and whatever official visitors who come through our doors don't do much to add to the volume. I suspect that the people from the Capital who come out to do the hiring when necessary unconsciously choose the naturally quiet because they are so used to Avoxes. I, of course, don't know that for certain.

Quiet is our normal. Then, there are my wife's bad days - the days when the silence in our house doesn't come about simply because it is natural, but because we are all actively trying to avoid any sounds that will cause her further pain. It isn't the same as a normal day, but it still feels natural. The silence feels caring as it springs out of concern for the well-being of a family member. We are united in the silence because we are united in a cause.

The silence in our house these days doesn't feel natural. It's odd because it isn't any quieter, but everything feels forced and stilted. I suspect that it is because for the first time ever my daughter isn't talking to me. It isn't angry. It isn't petulant. It's none of those things that they tell you to expect with teenagers. It is simply a kind of expectant silence. I can feel the wheels turning in her head whenever we are in the same room of the house (which admittedly isn't often). It's like she's trying to piece together a puzzle, but she hasn't found all the pieces yet. And to think I used to enjoy the fact that my child liked to figure things out. It isn't so enjoyable being the focus of the figuring. Mostly, because I would like to keep her out of what I am thinking.

This silence isn't normal because we aren't united in a cause. In fact, we are divided by one. I know the tension shows (to Madge, if likely not to anyone else) these last few days. The silence at the Reaping, the District farewell, and the attention grabbing parade have worn on my nerves as I've fielded a few discreet questions that I know will become a firestorm if things continue on.

I can't tell her that.

So, we continue through this bizarre silence. I'm not volunteering anything because I don't want to discuss it with her (can't really because there are so many parts of it that she doesn't know). She's not asking any of the questions I can see tumbling around behind her eyes when I look at her because she hasn't decided which one is the proper one to start with.

I can hear them in my head. Why don't I think her friend has a chance? Why was I upset by the parade? Why am I not telling her anything when I know she is wondering?

This is where we find ourselves as we settle in to watch the announcing of the scores. I am, actually, home early for once. We even ate supper together. It would have been nice if it was a normal day. I'm not sure we're ever going to have a normal day again.

Eleven.

My pleased daughter doesn't know that the Gamemakers have painted a target on her friend's back. My hopes just got raised even higher little girl doesn't know that her friend has drawn their attention onto her, onto us. She doesn't know what that could mean. I know. It must show in my face at that moment. Madge notices.

"Daddy?" She sounds confused. She sounds hopeful.

I can only shake my head in response. I can see it all in my head. I can see it starting again, and this time my child will be right in the middle of it.

"Daddy, this is a good thing." She sounds questioning now.

And for the first time in her life I raise my voice when I speak to her.

"She's not coming home!" She can't. She can't. The District can't go through this again. I look up to see Madge looking pale and concerned.

"What aren't you telling me?" She asks. She's too perceptive for her own good.

"Go to bed." I tell her. I wish it sounded more commanding and less like a tired plea.

"What do you know?" I can see the argument forming on her lips. I can see the determination to find out what it is that she hasn't been able to understand about my behavior sparking in her eyes. I can't do this with her now (maybe ever). I have to back her down.

"I said go to bed!" It echoes off the walls and bounces around the room between us shattering all the semblance of silence in our home – saying so much more than those five words should say. I can hear it reverberating around us with all the whispered insinuations that she must be hearing weaving themselves into her thoughts. The things she is thinking about the meaning of what I said and didn't say (of how I said it) are easily read in the expressions on her face. _I have secrets. I know things you don't know. I'm keeping them from you._ I can't fight back against those implications. All of them are true. Then, the recognition of the deeper implications starts to play across her features. _I don't trust you._ I can't fight back against that one either because it's true and not true all at the same time – not the least in the way that she is thinking, but not in any way that has explanations I can offer her.

She's out the door before I can be sure that those were tears beginning to leak from her eyes. Even without seeing for certain, I know that they had to be. How could they not be? I've shattered something between us. The father/daughter dynamic that we have always had has been destroyed with a few moments of conversation that didn't even have a conversation. It was more the avoiding of having one. It only took seconds, and I know that the two of us will never be the same.

The little girl who knew her daddy has been replaced with a young woman who knows that there are things about her father that he keeps secret from her.

There are things that I could tell her. There are reasons I could give. I could try to justify my anger. I could try to rationalize to her why she sees me practically demanding the death of her best friend. I could follow after her and offer words to try to patch up what is broken. I don't move. I don't even take a step in her direction. There are things she doesn't need to know. There are things that she should never see. There are dangerous things that lurk in those conversations that we are not going to have.

If I have to choose between my justification and her safety, her safety will win every time. Always. Forever. No matter what it costs me - even if what it costs me is her.


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I didn't expect to see him yesterday. I fully expected him to be gone before the rest of us awoke. I fully expected him to return after we had gone to bed. I fully expected to let it go by without comment.

It was Sunday.

Sundays are his days when nothing required demands his time. He has no place that he is required to be. I know how much that time of being free to choose means to my child who spends so much of his life feeling trapped by the lack of choices in his world.

He chooses how to spend his Sundays. I don't have to tell you what it says about his character that he chooses to spend them feeding his family.

I wasn't sure what he would choose to do with yesterday. For so long now, his chosen Sunday activities have included Katniss. They've been united in their circumstances and their choices. Sundays are their times to be in charge of their worlds. It has been the two of them together against everything life can throw.

He had to face the fact that he was at his first Sunday in what might be a forever string of Sundays of facing it alone. I expected him to mourn. I expected him to use the luxury of time that a Sunday affords to do all the thinking and railing and wondering that hasn't been allowed in the days since the Reaping.

That's been partly my doing. But Sundays are different. There aren't other obligations to keep. There aren't other places to be. I don't need him to focus on this Sunday. He can take the time in his woods and say all the things that he needs to say. The problem being that there is no one left to listen. I don't know what to do about that, but I won't complain about his disappearing.

That was my plan.

He was gone when I got up. I heard the door when he left. The rest of us proceeded as usual. The boys took Posy with them to play (I suspect they'll dump her off with Prim, she could likely use the distraction anyway). I was elbow deep in laundry when my expectations for the day went up in smoke.

My eldest was standing in the doorway looking into the room as if he didn't know if he was allowed to come in. He looked so young and so uncertain. The expression on his face made my heart hurt. He looked so lost. His eyes met mine, and we found ourselves in a situation that we haven't been in for years. He let me hold him. He didn't cry; we didn't speak. He just let himself have the comfort of being held.

My strong, stoic son who insists he is always fine has often left me mourning that he was forced to grow up so fast. I've never received such an explicit sign that he really hasn't. He does what he has to do. He takes care of who he has to take care of. He demonstrates a maturity that is so beyond his years every day of his life, but he is (despite eighteen years and circumstances) still a child. My child. And he was hurting, and he came to his mother to make it better. It's a good thing that the situation was not one that called for words because I didn't have any.

He stayed for I'm not sure how long, untangled himself, and left our home again. He returned late that evening with the produce of some trades at the Hob, and we didn't talk about what had happened.

Maybe we shouldn't. My Gale doesn't always function best with words.

He's been less tense today. Either the woods, or our mother/son moment or both seems to have done him good. The shortly starting interviews have been in the back of his mind all day, but he's been less surly with his brothers. He didn't even grumble about school this morning (although, maybe he's saving it for out of my presence).

The click of the television draws my attention, and I'm looking at the garish blue hair of the man we must listen to every year. To be honest, he seems to genuinely try to give each child a moment to be memorable, but he's fighting a losing battle. There are so many children from so many years that memorable isn't really an option. I suppose it's different in the Capital. They only need to be memorable enough to pick up some sponsors until they die. I shake off the thoughts and return my focus to turning Rory's head (complete with jaw hanging open) away from the barely dressed blond on the screen.

It runs along the lines of the parade - each child blending into the next. Posy's attention is drawn by the wings on the tiny little girl from 11.

"Are they going to make her fly?"

All of my children are glued to the screen when Katniss makes her appearance. For a few moments, she looks like Katniss despite the Capital created dress. She looks uncomfortable with the attention and somewhat surly. I notice the uptilt on the corners of Gale's mouth at this glimpse of his friend in a recognizable state. Then, she's gone. She's giggling and twirling and capturing the attention of the audience in the studio with some sort of vague, impractical teenage girl charm that I never would have dreamed that she could pull off. I can't decide whether it is kinder or worse that they turn the children into someone their families wouldn't recognize before they make them watch them die.

Gale's disbelief is palatable. He's staring at the screen even after she is replaced by the baker's boy who I vaguely register is referred to as Peeta. Gale seems as if he can't decide whether to be pleased by the positive response of the audience or to be insulted that she was so not her for the majority of those three minutes. I can see the slightest drop in his tension level in his shoulders, and I know that it is because it made him feel better to see her again. He turns to look at me and actually starts to say something. His posture and expression makes me think that it was going to be a question.

Then, Peeta Mellark is saying something that has Gale spinning back to the television with an expression that is easy to decipher as one part confusion to one part disbelief to three parts straight up angry.

I try to replay what it was that he said. I was so focused on Gale that I wasn't surfacely listening.

She came here with him – Katniss. The baker's boy has just told the world that he's in love with Katniss.


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

The click of the viewing screens coming to life is enough to attract everyone's attention (as if any of the adults could forget why they are gathered in the town square for long enough to lose track of the time). An expectant hush falls over the crowd (even the many who are too young to understand what is about to happen in front of them). This is the way in always goes. We always wait in silence for the start. We all know that the quiet hum of the electricity flowing into the screens will soon be replaced with clattering and screaming. The week of down time for the Districts after the Reaping has come to an end.

I am required to be here for the beginning of the Games. The platform from the Reaping is still in place, and I occupy one of two chairs on it. The Head Peacekeeper (being the father of a daughter I despise the man on principle despite the other kindnesses he has shown my District) occupies the seat beside me. Thus, authority is duly represented to those unfortunate enough to be gathered with us. We don't exchange words unless absolutely necessary. I prefer not to look at him. Needless to say, we sit in somber silence as the people gather. I've been told that the effect is one of detached reverence for the start of the Games. I'll take it. It's always nice when personal preferences happen to dovetail nicely with Capital necessitated appearances.

The screens show the seal of Panem but nothing else at present. There are still a few minutes before the Games will begin. There must be time to fix any problems with the screens before the slaughter starts. This is required viewing at its pinnacle. The children will be gathered in front of televisions in the school. Even the miners will stop working for the first hour. The screens are functioning fine. There are no last minute adjustments needed. There is nothing to do but wait the last few moments taking in the waiting silence of the square full of people I see in front of me.

If ever I have wondered whether 74 years has tempered the Capital's wrath for the Districts with mercy, I need only look at the crowd gathered in public for the start of each year's games to find my answer.

It is far too monumental a task for the Peacekeepers to make sure everyone is watching at all times. District 12 is small, but not that small. The Games can last for weeks, and everything can't shut down while they do. The Capital's solution is simple (for them). They send each District assigned public viewing times for the local authorities to implement.

Everything stops for the first hour of the Games. Everything stops for a feast. Otherwise, school and work continue with highlights broadcast to the children and the miners on their lunch break. There is a television in each shop, and (like all televisions in the District) they will be on from now until the Games end. There is no way to turn them off. We are never short of electricity during this time of year.

You are "trusted" to watch in your own home when you are there and awake. They make certain that each resident is watching under Peacekeeper supervision for at least two hours every day. The District is divided into groups, and each group has an assigned two hours in the square. From 6 am until 6 pm for the duration of the Games, the square is always full. For example, the mine workers are split into three different viewing groups. The school age children, the "service providing designated occupation holders," and the "District occupation undesignated" comprise the others.

"District occupation undesignated" covers all those who do not have an official Capital approved position. It includes the few who have survived to be too old to work (and are fortunate enough to have family that can and will take care of them). It includes all those who have "unofficial" ways of earning money (in official circles we refer to them as the women who take in laundry or do sewing for extra money, in unofficial circles we know it includes some of those who earn their living in the Hob). It covers housewives. It covers all children too young to have started attending school.

This is the group that is always required to be in the square for the beginning of the games. This is the group who the Capital requires to stand in public and watch the initial bloodbath – all the children in the District who are under the age of five.

There is no mercy in Panem.

The seal has faded away, and has been replaced with the glinting gold of the Cornucopia. The main screen will show the overview of the arena broadcast everywhere. One of the screens on each side will follow one of our tributes. It's so kind of the Capital to ensure that we don't miss out on a moment of our children in the arena.

I stand and turn to face the screen on my right (I'm not any more immune to the viewing requirement than the rest of the population of the Districts). It's the screen that will follow my daughter's friend. She blinks in the sunlight as her platform rises into place. Claudius Templesmith makes his welcome announcement, but he's already lost my attention.

It's been attracted by a glint of gold coming from Katniss's shirt. I recognize it for what it is as the camera moves to a close up. It's a pin – a mockingjay pin. A tribute from District 12 is wearing a symbol representing a Capital mistake right there on her shirt for all of Panem (all of _them_) to see, and I know that there is only one place that she could have gotten it. I mentally curse the time I must spend standing here. I mentally curse the hours until school lets out for the day.

My daughter has a lot of explaining to do.


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

It took me ages to settle Posy down to sleep. The viewing in the square was difficult for her this morning. Before this year, the things happening on the screens were a vague background that never captured her interest. It was too far away to see clearly, or it was too beyond her ability to process what she was seeing. Sometimes, if you're subtle, the Peacekeepers don't even say anything if you turn the littlest children around (they're too busy watching themselves, they nearly all have money riding on the outcome). If you make it too obvious that that is what you are doing, you'll draw someone's attention. It's a game we play, the mothers of District 12, to see how far we can get in shielding our children. It isn't as dangerous as it once was. Most of the mothers risk it to a greater or lesser degree. We know that we'll get harsh words first.

It wasn't always that way.

I can still remember the woman in the square the year I turned fourteen. Her body was there when the school children filed in for our mandatory viewing. There was a puddle of blood from the wound on her head where one of the Peacekeepers hit her with his rifle after she tried to turn her child's head so he wouldn't see his older sister beheaded on the screen. They made us leave her there all day. It was an example. It was a threat. It was a reminder. It was the way that things used to be.

Our children think winning brings something to the District. They've never lived through the aftermath of a winning year. They don't know how right they are, and they don't know how very wrong.

I thought of her today as I held Posy in the square. I thought of her as Posy wiggled and squirmed and demanded to watch Katniss. I thought of her and how desperate she must have been as Posy wailed and drew attention so that I had to let her turn around. I thought of her as Posy screamed when she realized that the red splattering on Katniss's face was blood.

I held my crying little girl who was calling out for Gale. I thought of Vick and Rory beyond my care watching at the school. I thought of Gale watching so intently that he wouldn't even notice the stares and searching eyes that were sure to find him every time Katniss featured on their screen. I hugged Posy tightly and whispered consolation as best I could. Katniss was fine. Katniss was running. She wasn't hurt at all. And I wondered what I would say when those words weren't adequate anymore. Not for Posy. Not for Gale.

I'm still wondering as I lay here brushing the hair from Posy's face as she finally succumbs to sleep. My children, all four, refused to leave their places in front of the television as they ate their supper this evening. They were all staring at the screen in some morbid fascination waiting for the occasional glimpses of Katniss still walking through the woods. They couldn't look away. I couldn't look away from them.

The boys behaved themselves and went off to their bed when told. Posy fought leaving Gale and began to whimper as soon as I laid her down. She's already jerked awake once calling for Gale to stop the "bad girl" from hurting Katniss. It hurts me that I know he heard.

He's still there in front of the television - silently imploring the screen for any momentary glimpse. Or maybe he is watching hoping for her not to appear. If they aren't showing her, nothing has happened. And nothing has happened is the best thing that can happen if you're hoping for someone to come home.

Part of me is thinking that it might have been easier if she had died at the start. It would have been hard at the beginning. It would have devastated Posy. It would have broken my heart to know that Gale went through that surrounded by whispering watchers where I couldn't be with him. But it would have been over. This isn't going to get better. Things get worse as they go. Every other child's death is going to give him that much more hope that she will be the one left standing at the end.

It's cruel the way they play us – this dangling of chances in front of people like my son. This is their Game, and they're the only ones who win. Gale doesn't know that yet. I didn't want him to find out firsthand.

I don't know how long it has taken me to put Posy to sleep. I only know it's gotten very late. I should send Gale to bed. I should insist he end his vigil. I don't get up. I don't go back in. I don't say a word. I don't know how to make him understand that his watching makes no difference. I don't know how to take his illusion of control away from him, and I don't really have the heart to try.

It's his voice that draws me back. If he's broken the silence of his vigil, then it seems somehow okay for me to intrude. I don't think he intended to let out his exclamation. Something took him by surprise. Something that wasn't good.

He looks apologetic on my entrance. He's looking for a line of little people trailing in my wake. I wave off his words. They're sleeping. They wouldn't have heard.

The screen is showing a girl trying to warm her hands over a fire. It's glowing in the darkness with an illusion of comfort that overlays the stupidity of the move. She's made herself visible to anyone who cares to see. She'll likely die for that mistake, but I'm not sure why it would have drawn a protest from Gale – aside from the wastefulness of it all.

"She's close to Katniss." He tells me after seeing the question on my face, and he resumes his staring as the camera pulls back and turns before closing in on a mostly concealed figure in a tree. I'll take his word for it that it is her. If the camera weren't so determinedly pointing, I don't know that I would notice there was anyone there at all.

The view changes to a different section of the arena, but Gale's gaze never wavers.

"You should probably get some sleep," I suggest.

"In a little while," he says.

But I hear it as a no. I expected as much. I sit with him. We don't speak. That seems to be our pattern now.

I drift off at some point. Gale must have as well. I can tell because of the way he jumps when the quiet is shattered by the frantic pleading of a girl.


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

My wife's father was a strange man. I think it goes without saying that the candy shop in District 12 is not the busiest of places. As a result, Mr. Donner could generally be found seated at a small table he kept in the corner with a game spread out across the top. I don't recall ever hearing him say what it was called – I don't think I ever exchanged words beyond general greeting pleasantries with the man. I noticed the game (as did everyone from the merchant kids who were lucky enough to have pocket money who saved it for weeks at a time in order to make a trip there to the Peacekeepers who seemed to provide most of the shop's business) because such a thing as board games are rare in District 12. This one even featured carved wooden pieces in different shapes.

Occasionally, one of the few truly old people in 12 would be seated across from him at the table. Mostly, it seemed like he played himself. Sometimes, a teenage boy (having been tempted by the prospect of spending time under the smiling eye of one of Donner's pretty daughters who were always working the counter) would sit himself down to have a "lesson."

I never took one of those lessons - my wife crept up into my notice later on in my life. But, I did pause for a moment to watch two or three times when one of the aged joined him for a match. It was confusing to watch because none of the pieces seemed to follow the same rules as the others, but there was something intriguing about the back and forth between the players. Move, counter. Move, counter. Those playing always looked like they were looking ahead to something beyond their next choice of piece. I suppose they were planning strategy.

That game is at the forefront of my mind today because I'm wondering how it is that my daughter seems to be playing it when she never met her grandfather.

I was disturbed by the sudden appearance of my daughter's pin on Katniss's person in the Games. I did not, however, foresee any difficulty in procuring answers as to why it was there. I was wrong.

Every question I have is met with a question of her own. She chooses questions that she suspects or knows that I will not answer. I remind her that I am the one asking questions, and the cycle continues. Move, counter. Move, counter.

Only, I'm obviously not choosing my moves well. I'm no closer to knowing what she was thinking when she handed that pin over. I'm no closer to discerning how much trouble we may be in. Yet, every time one of our cycles has completed, her questions are more pointed. They edge in closer to things that I don't want her knowing.

I've found myself retreating like one of those pieces being chased across that black and white squared board so long ago. I can't ask her questions without her working her way closer to what she thinks she wants to know. We are at an impasse.

I don't know where to go from here.

It has become abundantly apparent to me over the days between our initial confrontation and now that my well behaved, helpful daughter has always been well behaved and helpful because she decided to be herself. My parenting has no effect. If it did, I would have the answers to my questions, and she would have dropped hers.

It's a dangerous game she is playing, and I'm not even sure that she knows that she is playing it. The picture of her grandfather sitting at his board in the corner of his shop comes into my mind once again. It occurs to me that she gets the same expression of concentration on her face. I've never noticed before that that intense, focused look belongs to him.

Thinking of him makes me wish (for the first time ever) that my daughter had been born a little dim witted. I think it would be safer. She shares her grandfather's expression; I can't let her share his end. I know that no one taught my daughter to play that game because I've never seen the board or pieces again after the day they were scattered on the ground in front of the sweet shop with blood pooling on the ground and splattered in bright, shiny patches against the white of them. I shake off the memory.

This isn't a board game. This isn't an argument with an aggressive, new Head Peacekeeper that the rest of us didn't understand. This is her life, all our lives, and there is no place in it for the thoughts that she's been thinking.

I'll talk to her this morning before she goes to school. I'll talk to her when she gets home. I'll keep talking until she understands. I haven't wanted to do this. I haven't wanted to burden her with knowing, but she's left me with no options. I won't tell her all. I won't even tell her half. I'll find some way to make her understand with as few details as I can that keeping her head down – the entire District keeping our heads down – is the only option that we have.

She won't like it. I don't like it, but that's the way it is.

Whom do I think I'm kidding? I know that that won't work. I steel my resolve to adhere to my initial decision to not elaborate on anything.

If it's over soon, everything can still go back to normal. If it's over soon, explanations won't be necessary.

I can only hope it all goes away, but we have two children who have survived the bloodbath at the Cornucopia. Both of them are still alive as dawn approaches on day four of the Games. We haven't had two children survive day one in over a decade. Those kinds of changes in pattern draw attention. I feel heartless even thinking it, but that feeling is quickly overshadowed by the cold facts of reality. The best thing for everyone – their families, the District, and my subversive jewelry handing out daughter – is if our District tributes die quickly.

I'm propelled out of bed by the half-choked yell that I recognize as coming from my daughter. I don't bother with heading toward her room –she's taken to sleeping on the sofa in front of the downstairs television. She's staring at the screen where a wall of flame is bearing down on her friend.

Perhaps my worrying has been unwarranted. It looks as though the Gamemakers have opted to end the situation for me.


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

The last few days have been tense and unpleasant. My time in the square with Posy hasn't been as rough as the first day. She focuses on Katniss's screen, and all she knows is that Katniss has been walking. She doesn't understand that the girl she focused on so intently (so she could tell Gale all about it later) was slowly dying from dehydration. Gale knew (as did Rory and Vick) which made for a couple of tense surly evenings in our house.

He also spent a vast deal of time devising names for the Mellark boy that I would prefer his siblings not learn (I would have preferred he didn't learn them either, but I'm not unrealistic about the effects of attending the District school). He vocally wandered back and forth between cursing the baker's son for his choices in the arena and muttering appreciative comments whenever the boy on the screen was featured frustrating the Careers' attempts to figure out Katniss.

The girl whose pleading woke us on the second day didn't end up getting Katniss caught, so Gale refrained from hateful comments when she died. I fear for what happens in his head if Katniss lasts much longer. His hopes keep getting lifted, and they will eventually have him where they want him – emotionally invested in hoping for the deaths of other children. Will he lose the respectful moment of silence I have always observed in him at the deaths? Will he become one of the ones who cheer? I can't think about those things right now.

I can only think of the way he pushed Rory's hand from his shoulder as the freshly woken (by Gale's yelling) children crowded in front of the television to watch the fire chasing Katniss. I can only think of the expression on Rory's face as he processed the rejection. There's something brewing between the two of them. Now, when Gale is so caught up in the Games, is not the time for Rory to challenge his brother. I know them both – Gale so strong willed; Rory wanting so to be like him. In the temperamental state Gale is in, an altercation between the two can only end badly. I'll have to head it off. If I can.

Luckily, the fire balls stopped in time for school, or I would have had a mutiny on my hands.

Posy, at least, has had a rather calm day. She wasn't quite awake enough to understand the implications of the fireballs flying across the screen (and she's got it in her head that fire on the television is something that doesn't hurt, a consequence, I suppose, of her recollections of the tribute parade). She spent today's square time asking me why Katniss was falling asleep in her bath. And when was she going to wake up again?

Gale settled himself in front of the television as soon as he got home. Rory shut himself in the bedroom. Something happened, but it obviously wasn't the big blow up I've been dreading. I know my boys well enough to know that that would be far louder.

Vick arrives a few minutes later, and I coax him into the kitchen. He happily stirs the stew for me (he always likes to be able to say he's helping), and I see what information I can gather from my youngest boy. At ten, he doesn't prattle like Posy, but he is far more talkative than Gale (or even Rory). He likes attention, and this time alone with mama in the kitchen (Posy has once again stationed herself on Gale's lap) is something that he doesn't get as often as either of us would like.

And so, I let him talk about whatever he likes, and I get my answers in the process. Rory wants Gale to take him to the woods. This is nothing new. This is what Rory has wanted for as long as Gale has been going. He told Gale he would go on his own if Gale wouldn't take him. This is new. Gale blew him off. I know that was a mistake. Gale has gotten used to stepping into an unofficial father roll with his younger siblings. He often decrees more than he asks. He has fallen into the habit of expecting to be obeyed. That will only last for so long. The children will eventually push back. Rory will go behind Gale's back if he believes it's worth it. I need to have a talk with my second son.

"Rory wants to walk Prim home." Vick tells me, and I'm not sure where the jump in topic came from. I raise my eyebrows, and he continues. "He doesn't come with us because Gale won't come with us. He thinks if he does what Gale wants, then Gale will take him to the woods."

I don't have time to ponder this new development before Vick voices another of his comments on the situation.

"I like Madge," he announces as if it is a solemn declaration. "She didn't get to decide that she lives in town, and she listens when I talk."

"Sweetie," I start feeling guilty that my little boy may feel neglected and plan to ignore the implications of what he has overheard from his brother in favor of tackling the second half of his statement. Vick shakes his head.

"You listen too," he tells me. "But I can tell her secrets. You're my _mom_." He stresses the last word, and I try not to smile at the thought of what secrets a ten year old boy deems not appropriate for a mother's ears.

"Gale should tell someone his secrets," Vick tells me. "Maybe they wouldn't make him angry so much if he let them out sometimes."

I'm startled by this observation. Vick notices far more than we give him credit for.

"I think you're right," I tell him (wanting to encourage him before I offer my next piece of wisdom). "But, I don't think that you should say that to your brother."

"'Cause he'll be grumpy," Vick declares before launching into a story about a game at recess at school that is much more befitting a ten year old boy than the commentary on human nature he has been displaying.

He doesn't get far before we are drawn back to the television by the sound of Posy yelling "Run!"


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I leave the paperwork on my desk unfinished. I shouldn't do that, but I find myself unable to focus on the task at hand. My daughter's friend is up a tree with a pack of her would be killers gathered underneath. The image does little to encourage my attention on reviewing mine productivity reports. Just because I know that Katniss can't come home doesn't mean that I wanted her end to be painful. I should be home with Madge.

The dropping of the sponsor gift is what is delaying me. Once again, they have made us visible. One of the tributes from District 12 has drawn enough attention that people in the Capital are spending money on her.

And the boy . . .

The fact that he is doing whatever it is that he is doing with this love confession/protectiveness that has filled the screen for days is causing enough trouble all on its own. He isn't playing their game. Why has everyone seemed to have forgotten that it is always about more than just the two children sacrificed every year?

What is Haymitch thinking? Is he even thinking at all? He should understand better than anyone. He still let that pin through. He's still encouraging sponsors. It's insanity. And my daughter thinks that it is wonderful. That's why I've been sitting here for the past three hours – accomplishing nothing – unable to bring myself to stand up and go home.

She hasn't said it in so many words, but I can feel it in her gaze every time we share the same space. She's drawn a line that I can only cross through capitulation or explanation. I have no inclination for either. Thus, our impasse continues. I want her to be a little girl. I want her to come to me with her scraped knee and that look that says she knows daddy can make it better. If only it were that simple. If only I had anything to offer that she would be willing to accept.

I don't. I only have secrets that I am unwilling to share. After watching her through this whole ordeal, I am beginning to believe that she wouldn't agree with me if I did. This child I have raised, who is spoiling all my preconceptions of her these days, would choose the more dangerous path. It would be easier for her to take; she doesn't have a child whose safety depends on her choices. I've caught myself wondering of late exactly what it was that her Grandmother Donner taught her during their time together. Surely it couldn't have been much. The woman died when she was eight.

My wife is no help. Her only words to me on the subject were that I should allow Madge to have her hope – that I should learn to be willing to believe in the possibility of better myself. I don't know what to make of those words. I feel like I have two strangers living in my house. It feels like we're all keeping secrets and the two of them are united in theirs while I'm left out in the cold.

Maybe I have been lying to myself. Maybe I have more reasons than I realized for not making my way home. Maybe I should get up now and go.

It's my house. It's my wife. It's my daughter. I'm going.

I will be there for Madge whether she wants me or not. Her friend isn't likely to make it much beyond morning. If she abandons her attempt at cutting free that nest, the Careers will likely find a way to finish her off. If she continues it, the insects will likely finish her before she finishes her task. I'm hoping for the second. It will be quicker for Katniss. It will be less bloody for my daughter. I'm standing firm in my belief that the tributes from District 12 will not be coming home. No matter what my daughter thinks. No matter what my wife hints at.

When I exit the building, there are people in the square. That is unexpected. I haven't seen anyone in the square after required hours in years. Granted, the tribute screens for our District are generally blank by this point in the Games. There are four people keeping vigil in the square. Katniss is in her tree. The Mellark boy is lying at its base keeping some sort of vigil of his own.

I recognize my daughter as one of the two blond headed girls sitting on a blanket placed for the best view of Katniss's screen. The other girl is smaller. I can't be sure from the angle at which I stand, but I would assume that it is Katniss's sister. The two of them share a second blanket draped across their laps in defense from the slight chill that has crept into the air. Their heads are bent toward each other and the faint sound of whispering reaches my ears. I cannot distinguish the words.

I shouldn't let them stay out here alone. I'm starting to move in their direction wondering if Madge is annoyed enough with me that she will ignore a direct order to go home when my attention wavers to the other two in the square. Two dark haired boys are having some sort of whispered argument far enough back to not disrupt the girls.

It takes me a moment to recognize the one facing me (I blame the poor lighting). It's the boy who accompanies Katniss on her deliveries to our home. He catches my eye and nods his head in acknowledgement of my presence. The other boy (significantly shorter) turns to face me as well. He looks at the older boy (his brother I'm guessing) for a moment before walking over and sinking down on the blanket next to the little girl. The Hawthorne boy looks at them for a moment before sighing and looking back at me. We don't exchange words, but a message is still conveyed. He's not going anywhere. He'll be here as long as they are (longer if he gets his way I would be willing to bet). He'll keep an eye on them.

I shouldn't do it. I should face Madge's potential displeasure and march over and inform her that she can't just sit in the public square in the middle of the night. But, I don't. I leave them there in their waiting vigil – over Katniss, over each other – and continue on to my home.

Madge is in the square. My wife is unconscious. I haven't got anything constructive to do. I go to bed.

I wake up in the morning after tossing and turning for much of the night from fretting over the unfinished work on my desk and the uncomfortable situation with my daughter. The image on the screen as I come downstairs isn't helping.

She must have managed to drop the nest. They must not have stung her as badly as I believed they would. She's still moving. Sluggishly. Bizarrely. But she's moving. She's tugging a bow out of the hands of an obviously deceased girl.

A bow.

She's gotten a bow. If she survives the aftermath of the tracker jacker venom, the whole of Panem is going to see her shoot a bow and arrow. I'm not stupid. I know her skills, and I know that no thinking person (especially not _them_) is going to believe that she learned such a thing in two and a half days of training.

Everything I've feared since those first awful moments of the tribute parade is coming crashing in on me again.

If _they_ see her shoot . . .

If _they_ know . . .

It won't matter if she dies. It won't matter if the rest of the Districts and the Capital forget what they saw.

_Their_ eyes will be on District 12, and nothing good ever comes from being visible to _them_.


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

My family's entire world has been upended once again. A media team from the Capital has been dispatched to District 12. They are waiting to see who makes the final eight in the Games. Then, they will begin the friends and family interviews. Everyone and their uncle pointed out Gale when they started compiling their list of who to interview pertaining to Katniss. The woman who heads the group of them took one look at my surly eldest and announced "Oh no, this will never do. You're far too good looking for a friend interview."

Before Gale could comment (I should be grateful to the woman for cutting him off before his mouth could get him into trouble), she had turned to me and proclaimed how delighted she was to finally have a member of a tribute's family to work with who was already camera ready. And wasn't I so pleased that my niece was making such a good showing for our District in the Games?

What could we do? Nothing, that's what. So, now my children have become Katniss's cousins. I am her aunt (although no one has bothered to decipher how it is that that is supposed to be possible).

They descended on us late Sunday evening. If I had been thinking, I would have expected them to be coming.

Vick came home Sunday afternoon from doing his laundry deliveries in half his usual time. He ignored a mopey Gale who had spent the entirety of the day on the couch staring at the screen (if the fence weren't on he would be so much better, this not being able to do anything is tearing him apart).

"Madge couldn't talk to me today," Vick informed me as he handed over the small pile of coins he had collected. "There were strange people going into her house." My first thought was to wonder just how much time my son generally spends telling his _secrets_ to the Mayor's daughter. This was interrupted by Vick's continued conversing.

"Madge said they came for the interviews," he informed me sounding proud of being able to impart this bit of knowledge to the rest of us. "One of the women was really shiny."

"People can't be shiny," Rory retorted having come into the kitchen for a drink and catching that last bit of his brother's words.

"She is," Vick insisted. "She's all covered in silver pictures."

Gale must have noticed the impending argument between his younger siblings because he removed himself from the couch to intercede. I was pleased to see him in motion. He needed to get away from the television.

It's not like he was going to miss anything important. The truth is that there hadn't been much to watch. Katniss had been lying on the ground muttering and occasionally calling out. Nothing was intelligible. Consequently, they didn't show her often on the regular broadcast. She and the others who were stung by the tracker jackers appeared once every few hours. The viewers in the Capital must not have found the incoherent mutterings of the hallucinating very entertaining.

In a way, that was better for my family. Gale and Rory had stayed out all night the night she spent up in that tree with the Careers gathered under her. With nothing to be seen (even on the District tribute screens in the square) they stayed home and slept. Rory stayed home because Gale stayed home. Gale stayed home because he knew that if anything happened with her she would once again become a focus on the television in our home. I think he was sleeping while he could. I think he expected there to be little sleeping when she woke up again.

I didn't have the heart to bring up the _if_ to that statement when speaking to Gale. I don't know much about tracker jackers. There aren't enough trees within the boundaries of District 12 for their nests to be common. We learned about them in school once upon a time. They were part of our history lectures. We must always remember that the Capital can destroy us with their creations. We wouldn't want to miss an opportunity to drill that into the school children's heads.

Katniss certainly wasn't stung as many times as those two girls who died nearly immediately, but the stings she did receive couldn't have been good for her health. Dehydration could have ended her if she had stayed unconscious for very much longer.

Of course, I didn't discuss this with Gale. He wasn't inclined to discuss much. He was hurting and worried about Katniss. He was annoyed that I let Rory follow him to the square the other night. I wasn't sorry. It had broken some of the tension between them. The remaining tension (and the annoyance) has now disappeared in the face of our present circumstances.

Vick's news was the only warning we got. By the time I had finished the supper dishes that evening, the "shiny" woman Vick had described was standing on our doorstep. We have since established for Vick that said "shininess" are tattoos. Her face and arms are covered in silver designs. Vick feels vindicated in his almost disagreement with Rory. Rory is ignoring that it ever happened in typical older brother fashion. That's the only bit of amusement that we have managed to squeeze out of this situation.

She spent less than ten minutes in our home that night, but she had already made her "we must be Katniss's family" pronouncement. So, wherever we go, a member of her team is watching us. It's really quite creepy. When I'm in the square, one of them is there. When I go to town, one of them follows. One of them was peering in the window Monday afternoon just after Katniss had woken up.

I vaguely remember there being a reporter here before – during the Quarter Quell. I don't remember much about that man (just that his hair drew every eye in the street when he walked by). I hadn't anything to do with either the Abernathys or the sweet shop people, so I didn't know what it was like to have any and all semblance of privacy removed from your life.

I know now, and they haven't even started asking questions yet. I shudder to think what it will be like when they really get going. Mostly, I worry what will happen if someone doesn't guard their words carefully enough and lets out where my son usually spends his Sundays.


	16. Chapter 16

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

The chaos of the destruction being displayed on the television screen is oddly appropriate as an analogy to where my life is about to go. The carefully gathered and protected supplies of the Careers are now splintered fragments spread over the ground as the result of Katniss's interference. Similarly, the lives that everyone in District 12 have led of late (the lives that I have so carefully tried to protect) are about to become splintered fragments blown apart by the returned observance of the Capital upon us.

I can give up on believing that everything can go back to normal. Normal won't exist anymore. It's over.

They know that she knew how to handle that bow and arrow before she volunteered for these Games. So many people in this District won't understand what that means for us. They see the Careers demonstrate knowledge of weapons year after year. We all know that they train despite the prohibition of such activities. Most won't see the difference at first glance, but it's there. The children of District 1 and 2 come to the Games knowing how to use knives and swords and maces. The children of District 4 come to the Games knowing how to use spears and nets. The latter is tolerated because it belongs to their industry. The former is tolerated because of what use are such things against the gun armed Peacekeepers. Some Districts could get away with showing an inclination for a weapon. No one would blink if a child from 7 was proficient with an ax. No one would think twice if a child from 10 displayed some ability with ropes. We aren't afforded such security here.

There is no plausible reason for Katniss Everdeen to know how to use a bow and arrow. They will come down on District 3 for their tribute's ability to wire a bomb. They will come down on us for our tribute's ability to hunt with a long range weapon.

Her death now will not change that fact. They will find a way to punish us for a child's ability to feed her family. It's only a question of when. The general audience in the Capital saw only an unexpectedly good show when she set off that explosion. _They_ saw a District that is allowing flaunting of their authority. _They_ were already suspicious when they saw her hunting. I have the proof of that sitting on my desk in front of me. I might have been able to pass off her shooting of birds and rabbits as the good luck of the desperately hungry. That comfort of still being able to try to fix the situation is gone.

_Our weapons training experts inform us that a high level of upper body/arm strength is required to use the bow and arrow that Miss Everdeen is currently using so effectively in the 74__th__ Annual Hunger Games. We are pleased to learn that District 12 is making such an effort to prepare its students to become productive workers in their token industry. We understand that the acquisition of new employees to the mines that are already prepared for the strenuousness of the work is a wonderful boon to efficiency. We applaud what must be an excellent school physical education program (and the inclusion of the girls in the preparation work as well), and we look forward to inspecting the curriculum in detail. Expect notification of a team to be dispatched for said purpose in the near future. We hope to . . ._

The letter mocks me from its place on my desk. It was a warning. (Although what I was supposed to do to fix the situation with Katniss when she was in the arena and I was here, I have no idea.) Sometimes, I think they enjoy toying with us almost as much as they enjoy being in control. Some days I wish they would just come out and state their purpose and their threats instead of the hiding behind pleasant memos with underlying meanings that seem to be their preferred method of operation. It's too easy to get caught up in thinking you have a chance to appease them when they are playing their model of civility game.

They are never appeased. All my efforts have been in vain. If it wasn't Katniss, it would have been someone else. One of the children would have eventually given them a reason, and it all would have begun again. I could have done other things. I could have cracked down on Katniss and the others like her who go to the woods. I could have encouraged the Peacekeepers to not be so lax. I could have pushed for the traditional harsh punishments to discourage the disobedience that is so rampant here that some of the people don't even know that they are being disobedient. I could have been harsher. I could have created a District where the Katniss on the screen couldn't have existed. I don't know if I've made the right decision or not. It's going to be so much worse on them now. They've had the little freedoms that they didn't even realize were freedoms for so long that having them taken away is going to be so much harder than if they didn't know what it was that they were losing. Maybe it would have been kinder if I hadn't made such an effort. Maybe it would have been better if I hadn't shielded them the way that I have.

Maybe I should have reported Cray instead of counting my blessings when I realized what kind of Head Peacekeeper he was going to be.

I don't know. I don't know if I was right or wrong. I don't know if I could have been the kind of mayor that the Capital would have chosen to have me be. I don't know if I could have come home to my wife and daughter and looked them in the eye each day if I had. I don't know anything anymore except that very bad things are coming, and there's nothing I can do to stop them.


	17. Chapter 17

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I have never before understood what it means to be smothered by the people around you, but it seems as if it is the only word that pops into my head when I have a moment to think about our situation these days (such moments are, admittedly, scarce as I'm generally far too busy being smothered to have a moment to do anything but worry about what is being said). I thought the Capital people were bad when they were doing their initial poking around. I would give quite a bit for things to go back to merely "bad." From the moment that deranged child from 2 snapped the neck of that little boy from 3, they haven't given us a moment's peace. If they aren't physically present, we are constantly guarding our words and looking over our shoulders wondering when (and from where) they are going to pop out at us next.

Posy is, predictably, the one taking everything the most in stride. She's fond of the "shiny lady" who comes to ask her questions about when Katniss was on fire. She picked up the nickname from Vick and refuses to use any other form of address. Luckily, the reporter from the Capital doesn't seem to mind. I think she may be flattered by Posy's gushing about the "pretty pictures" on her arms. In truth, the woman tries to steer Posy into other conversational grounds about Katniss, but she seems to be sensible enough to realize that Posy is four and her topics for discussion are limited. All she really wanted were the scenes of a cute little girl to cut into her footage, and the film of Posy chatting animatedly about the "pretty fire that didn't burn" fit into her narrative nicely. I've worried about what Posy might say that they might find offensive, but she is stubbornly sticking to her discussions of fire. Vick has been displaying a strangely smirky smile while standing in the background during those moments. This makes me think that he may have had a hand in her display, but I may be reading too much into the situation.

I'm pleased to see the smirk when it appears because that is the only time that I've seen Vick smile since our ordeal of being stalked first began. Have I mentioned that I've been feeling like one of those animals from the woods must feel when Katniss or Gale are hunting them? This perpetual feeling of being watched is wearing.

No one is showing that more than Vick. He's jumpy and looks frazzled, but when the reporter turns her attention to him for questions he keeps up a teary eyed commentary about how he is so proud but he hopes his "Cousin Katniss" comes home soon because we all really miss her. He looks wide eyed and innocent and one of the staff even comes over and pats him on the shoulder afterwards and tells him that she's sure everything will turn out alright in the end. I'm not sure where he learned it. I'm not sure where he got the idea in the first place, but he has them eating out of the palm of his hand. The instant he is off camera the tension begins to show again, and he looks like he may break at any moment. He's not talking to me like he usually does either. Every time I try he looks around as if someone may be listening in and finds a reason to excuse himself.

The saddest part is that he is right. It isn't safe to talk about why he is so tense because someone may be listening at any given time. It's killing me. The only information I've gotten out of him is that no one is walking Prim back and forth to school anymore because she doesn't want her own personal set of Capital followers to start bothering anyone else. That girl is stronger and braver in her own way than her sister generally gives her credit for.

Rory is so focused on Gale that I don't think he truly notices the Capital people half the time. He watches Gale and mimics his actions and words with his own Rory twist. The reporter has gotten less out of him than she has out of Gale, and that's saying something. All he ever says to her is a "Guess we'll have to wait and see" with a small shrug of his shoulders. I think she's given up on getting anything further.

Gale, well, she's got no interest in giving up on prying information out of Gale. When she isn't gushing over his "simply made for the camera" appearance, she's springing what I'm sure she thinks are clever questions on him. They aren't really that clever, and more of them are about my son's personal life than anyone would expect for an interview that is supposed to be focused on Katniss.

Gale is equally unimpressed with her questions (and is downright brooding over the whole cousin thing). I've always thought that my child had a tendency towards surliness. I now know that I've never actually seen surly before. He's positively glowering every time one of the people from the Capital is in his line of vision. I'm starting to wonder about the sanity of our practically live in reporter because she very nearly purrs every time he gruffly dodges another one of her questions and starts mumbling about how all women love a ruggedly handsome bad boy. I can't say that I appreciate the way the woman (who has to be at least my age, likely older, it's hard to tell with those from the Capital) keeps looking my baby over.

We've been watching the periodic flashes of Rue trapped in that net for a while when she departs leaving only a camera man behind. They alternate shots of Katniss looking for her with shots of the boy from 1 working his way toward her position. It's just a question of who will get there first. It's sick that they've left a camera to tape my children's reactions if bloodshed is forthcoming. It's sicker that there isn't anything that I can do about it.

Posy is perched on Gale's lap (not understanding really, but knowing that her "Rue who had wings" is stuck). Vick has cuddled up against me on the sofa. I should be making supper, but we're all entranced by the display and the nagging feeling that something awful is about to happen. I should be beyond that. There isn't anything not awful about the Games, but I'm sitting with the rest of them.

And so we wait.


	18. Chapter 18

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I confess that I may, may have had a momentary lapse of sanity when Katniss made her thanks to the people of District 11. The laughter that bubbled out of me was certainly not normal and may have even been bordering on hysterical. I defy anyone in my position to produce a stable reaction when facing the prospect of the repercussions of such openly displayed rebellion. It must have been loud as well because a hesitant knocking at my door a few moments later revealed a confused looking man on his way out from checking on my wife asking if I was okay – as if I would confide in him if I wasn't. The only constructive thing that blasted District doctor has ever managed to do for my family is to secure her exemption from the mandatory viewings of the Games in the square. For the sake of that, I politely tell him that everything is fine (instead of laying into him about minding his own business) and send him on his way.

After he is gone, I slip in to check on my wife myself. It's a long standing habit. It generally serves no purpose as she is nearly always sleeping after his visits. This time she is awake. She is coherent. The drawn lines on her face tell me that she is in pain, but the vial by her bedside tells me she has yet to take anything for it.

"I knew you would be looking in," she tells me. "I wanted to talk to you."

"Your medicine . . ."

"It can wait," her voice is forceful.

"You want to talk about Madge," I conclude.

Her eyes close for a moment as if a stronger twinge of pain has hit her. When they open, they have a dreamy, far off sort of look in them.

"She looks like Maysilee," she tells me with something nearing reverence in her voice.

"She looks like you," I remind her gently. Her sister's name (while not forbidden in my wife's presence) is territory that we usually do not venture into.

"No," she whispers so softly that I wonder if I have imagined it. "No, she has Maysilee's eyes."

Her eyes shift to me and they lose the dreamy quality. She looks focused. Whatever it is she wants to tell me is important to her.

"It frightened me when she was younger – especially when my mother would tell her stories. They were only ever just stories for me, but Maysilee was different. They meant something to her – they were more than just stories. Her eyes always sparkled when she talked about them. Madge has the same look. I fought with mother over it. I'm sorry for that now. I didn't understand. I didn't want her to be like Maysilee. I didn't want her to be like my father. I changed my mind later. I never told you that, did I? I'm sorry for that as well."

Her finger tips stretch out toward me, and I offer her my hand as I sit beside her on the bed. I should say something, but my throat feels constricted, and I know there would be no words that wouldn't break the spell we're currently wrapped up in. The darkness in the room forms some sort of barrier against the world. It's just the two of us. I miss those days. I miss having someone confide in me. I miss having someone to confide in. For years now, our conversations have revolved only around Madge (and lately they've been more disagreements than confidences). Somehow, the two of us telling each other what we're thinking as opposed to what Madge is thinking or doing has gotten lost along the way.

"You asked me why on her first Reaping Day that I had given her that pin. You were upset, do you remember?"

Of course, I remember. Our only child's name had made its first appearance in that glass ball on the stage in the town square. We had seven years of chances to lose her stretching out in front of us, and my little girl had come proudly up to me to show her "Aunt Maysilee's pin" that mama had pinned to her dress. I didn't even know that my wife had that pin. And to give it to our daughter to wear while she took her chances of being taken to the Games when the previous owner had died in the Games? It was beyond morbid. And it was a _mockingjay_. I had been angry and upset, and I had thought that my wife's mind had snapped under the strain of worrying about what was coming.

I didn't say any of that. I merely responded with a strained "yes."

"I didn't answer you," she reminded me. "I pretended the morphling had kicked in." She pauses. "I hadn't taken morphling that day. I never take morphling on Reaping Day. Even when it's bad. I always watch to make sure it isn't her."

She squeezes my hand, and I'm so caught up in the moment of our united worry over Madge that I forget to be upset with her over the way she used her illness to play me. If she's telling me now, it must be for a reason.

"I gave it to her because it means something to her – like it meant to Maysilee, like it meant to my father. She's not like us. She doesn't look at this world and try to figure out the easiest way to get herself through it unscathed. She looks at it and sees everything that it could be. And she doesn't just believe that things could be better. She _knows_. She has conviction. She has _hope_. She hates being at odds with you, but can't you see? There's nothing else for her to do. She won't compromise what she knows just to make it easier on herself. She doesn't know how. Do you realize how special our little girl is?"

"Do you realize what happens to those kind of thinkers in Panem?" I accuse her.

Her hands have found my face and her thumbs are wiping at the tears that have begun to leak from my eyes.

"Do you realize what happens to Panem when that kind of thinking is let loose on it?"

I start to pull away. She can't be serious. She can't honestly be supportive of our daughter being in such a dangerous position. She latches on to my wrist and pulls me back.

"She's not going to lead an army charging against the Capital, you know. She's just fighting her own battles in her own way. You can't ask her to give that up. She wouldn't be _her_ anymore."

"I just want her to be safe," I choke out.

"You know as well as I do," she counters, "that there is no such thing."


	19. Chapter 19

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I knew that something was coming. It is, perhaps, the sole advantage of having the people from the Capital tripping over us at every turn. If something changes with them, something is happening in the Games. She didn't leave us to the watchful eye of the camera man after she finished her last round of questions (as had been her habit). She stayed looking thoughtful in a plotting sort of a way after once again walking us through every question she could think of in regards to the poor little girl from District 11 and her District's response. She was hovering, and it felt like nothing so much as if she were impatiently waiting for her opportunity to pounce.

Gale, already teetering on the brink of an explosion after watching the careless way that Katniss had been conducting herself since the little girl had been sung to rest in her arms, was ostensibly helping me to dry and put away dishes while the media team sat watching the Games near the children. He was wearing down, and it wasn't, isn't safe for anyone to lose their temper in front of them. If I didn't think they would follow him, I would have devised some sort of an errand to send him out on to get him away for a few moments of peace.

He had been containing himself to muttered grumbling about Katniss's inattention, but I saw him when that little girl was lifted away decorated in flowers. He only had eyes for Posy. Anyone else wouldn't have noticed, but I'm his mother. I saw the way his eyes shifted whenever he thought that no one from the Capital was paying attention. I saw the way the expression softened and the way he bit his lower lip. He hasn't done that for ages. It's a nervous gesture from his childhood – a tell that he's learned to leave behind.

I know what he was seeing in those moments. I know that dark complected little girl had been replaced in his mind's eye by his imagination aged sister. I know because I've seen it myself at some point for each and every one of them. No matter how detached you try to make yourself, there will always be something that catches you by surprise with the reminder that it could so easily be one of your own up there.

Our heads were close together as I passed him a plate, and he whispered, "A feast, do you think?"

I nodded in reply as I took in the concerned expression that he had dropped his usual guard enough to allow me to see.

"She won't go," he whispered. "There's nothing that she needs."

The words weren't questions, but the questions could be clearly heard underneath the words. _I'm right, aren't I? She won't go? Tell me, mama, that it's all going to be okay._

And I wish I could. I wish I could tell him that it's all going to be okay. That these reporters will go away and Katniss will come home and everything in all our lives will all be the way it was before. But, I can't.

But, I can give him this much.

"She has no reason to go," I agree.

And he nods and gives me a little bit of a smile. And his expression is once again designed to give as little to the Capital as he can. And I'm wondering what it is I'm missing because there isn't anything that they can offer her that will be worth the risk. But why, if that's the truth, are they still here waiting for our reaction?

So, when the announcement of the rule change comes, it's a shock because they've never done such a thing before. But it isn't, because they had to be up to something to be so determined to have the camera on our faces when it was announced.

They didn't get much, but it was still more than we would have liked to have given. Posy, still sniffling occasionally over Rue, didn't understand what the words meant. She was still crushed over what she had witnessed with the little girl she had watched fly through the trees. Gale only made it to his whispered conference with me in the first place because she had drifted off to sleep at the time.

Vick had immediately burst into tears and starting repeating over and over that he just wanted his cousin to come home. He made such a racket that it actually bought Gale enough time to compose himself from the shock enough to give his usual, evasive answers when that woman started grilling him about his thoughts on this development in the tribute's "riveting relationship." I'm sure she noticed the way his hands were shaking, but Rory got to her before she could push him too far.

"That's unexpected," he announced loudly, seizing the spotlight from his brother by his unexpected insertion of himself into the conversation. "We'll just have to see what happens."

Vick started up the waterworks again which set off Posy. By the time both of them were calmed down and put to bed, the only remaining interloper in our home was the ever persistent (or chronically ordered to remain behind) camera man who looked as if he fully intended to spend the duration of the night sprawled out in one of my living room chairs.

If the people from the Capital ever leave us alone again, I might find out if my two younger boys had a plan for the rescue of their brother.

There are two of them in the square as I hold Posy balanced on my hip. One watches the two of us, and one watches Ari Everdeen as she stands by my side. This "cousin" theory has led to our being gradually pushed into standing together by the rest of the crowd. I'm not entirely certain how it happened. It just suddenly was.

The girl on the screen is focused and watchful, and everything about her screams that she knows exactly what she is doing as she searches the arena for her District partner. It occurs to me as I shift Posy to my other side in an attempt to even out the back ache that this is the closest I will ever come to seeing what Gale looks like when he hunts. I can picture it in my head – the way his surefooted tread would find a path as silently as I see on the screen in front of me, the focused expression his face would have as he tuned out everything not of consequence to his goal.

I shake it off as our two tribute screens merge into the same image. They're together now, and as Rory says to our media team, "we'll have to see what happens."


	20. Chapter 20

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I had been wondering. Nothing in the Games happens without a definite reason. A shift in tradition as colossal as that rule change they offered had to have something huge behind it. I see now that it was the first step in a carefully constructed trap.

Katniss was a serious contender in these Games (an unexpected one), and Katniss wasn't favored. They don't preselect the winners for the Games. They seem to have some sort of strange sense o calling it honor seems horribly wrong that requires that they don't actively create a situation where there is clearly only one tribute that can win. They do not, however, demonstrate any hesitancy in shifting the odds in certain tributes' favor (or shifting the odds not in other tributes' favor). They are stacking the odds against Katniss and doing it in a cleverly concealed manner that prevents anyone from openly accusing them of doing so.

From little pieces of information that have drifted through, the ordinary citizens of the Capital are cheering on this romance angle in droves. Perhaps, after 73 years of never ending bloodshed, they've gotten bored and are grasping at anything that is a chance at something different. Maybe the Mellark boy's way of conducting himself is just so sappily attractive to what must be the somewhat jaded women of the Capital that they are all fawning over him and deciding to want what he wants.

I don't know.

I only know that they have backed Katniss into a corner. They have taken her from someone who would have (in the position of only protecting herself) used her long range weapon skills to effectively eliminate much of the competition and worked her way closer to the end to someone who cannot simply take care of herself. She must temper her own plans and survival with the necessity of caring for and ensuring the survival of someone else. And this someone else is injured and near death with little to no ability to assist.

They never would have drawn her in to the center of the feast with an offer of something for herself. But, they've drawn her in now. They've even given the romance backers in the Capital a spectacular show what with the drugging and all.

They may kill her today. It's an odd feeling to think of it. I've spent so much of these Games hoping for her end to come quickly. There were so many things that I was counting on that don't seem to matter anymore. We've already drawn their attention. There's nothing else that she can do in these Games to bring any more attention to us. We'll be getting whatever they deem as coming to us as soon as they decide it is the opportune time. The only question remaining is whether or not Katniss will be coming home to share in the punishment. They've leveraged against her, yet there is still a chance that she makes it through the day. There is still a chance that she will still be standing at the end.

I'm not sure that I understand the Gamemakers targeting of her at this point. With the way they usually think about things, you would think that they would want her to survive so they could rub the consequences into her face. Of course, what do I know? I'm not them.

It doesn't matter to the District anymore whether she survives or not, but it matters to her family and to my daughter.

So, I'm sitting in our living room with Madge as Katniss makes her preparations. She was a bit unsettled when I came in, but she must have sensed the change in my tension level because she smiled before turning back to the television. She'll be keeping vigil tonight. I can tell.

"They think they're tricking her, don't they?" She asks me out of the blue. She isn't looking at me, but I can hear it in her voice. She's testing the waters. She's seeing if I'm willing to break our impasse.

"They do."

"That's what I thought," she offers still staring as the scene shifts to the preparations of other tributes. "Prim will be in the square."

She's waiting for my response. It's difficult for me to craft one. She's still telling me that she's going. She's not asking, but she is, at least, including me in her passing of information. I don't like them out alone in the dark even with their background escort.

"I'll come with you," I tell her. Her head whips around but she looks more happy than surprised. "Blankets?" I ask.

She nods and heads up the stairs. I assume she's going to fetch some. I really want to ask why Katniss's sister keeps her vigil nights in the square with my daughter as opposed to with her mother, but I'm not going to say anything to jeopardize this opportunity for Madge and me to restore our peaceful relationship.

When we arrive to take our place in front of the tribute screens, we aren't the only ones there. I expected Prim. I expected the two dark haired boys that are with her. I did not expect the baker and his other boys. I did not expect the scattered others keeping to the shadows on the edges of the square.

They are lurking, not quite joining those of us who are openly keeping watch (perhaps because of the Capital cameras that have followed the tributes' families) , but they are here.

It's not necessarily logical. We aren't accomplishing anything. Our presence won't change the outcome of the coming morning's events. We are simply demonstrating solidarity with our tributes. We are staking our claim that they matter. We are stating our belief that we should care – that we do care. We are demonstrating solidarity with each other as a District. The Seam and Town "classes" are both represented, and we are breaking our pattern. We are displaying a shift. Who knows how _they_ will view this moment in the square? Will they see it as rebellious? Will they find it dangerous?

I find that, for this night, I don't care. And neither does anyone else in this square.

Look at our District. Who knew we had it in us?


	21. Chapter 21

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

Everything stops for a feast.

There are, however, only so many things to be stopped at dawn on a Sunday morning. The square is crowded to overflowing just as it is on Reaping Day. The Peacekeepers made their rounds nearly an hour ago – banging on doors and issuing threats about what would happen to anyone who didn't make it to the square on time. I had only to ready Vick and Posy – the older boys had been here all night. The mayor was whispering something in his daughter's ear as I guided my little ones toward their brothers. She looked pleased about whatever it was he said before he hurried off to his place on the platform. She had also spent the night in the square – the less than put together appearance and the bleary eyes were a giveaway. I, from what Vick has told me, expected that from her – I didn't expect that her father would look the same.

I had arrived early enough (determined to reach my boys before the crowd blocked them in) that it was easy enough to note that the male section of the baker's family looked the same. It must have been quite the gathering last night – and as Gale shows no signs of having been in a fight, this mix must have coexisted peacefully in their purpose. Interesting. Or it would be if my mind was clear enough to think on it. Gale's opinions of the baker's son are not always complimentary, nor are they usually kept quiet. It's reassuring to know that my volatile oldest has enough sense to refrain from picking unnecessary fights (or at least he does when there are Capital cameras rolling).

As the crowd grew thicker, the children formed their own little wall around Prim that subtly, yet successfully blocked her Capital followers from getting a good view of her face. Vick and Rory stand in front of her. Gale and Madge each take a side. They slipped into place so effortlessly and without any discussion that I presume that this has become their standard practice during their mandatory viewing time slot.

I found myself behind Madge and next to Ari Everdeen worrying over how I was going to shield Posy with our Capital watchers so clearly focused on the knot of us. Posy was, however, not about to spend another time in the square fidgeting in my arms – not when she had Gale to go to. She demanded to be held by her brother, and she got her way. I don't like it.

Even in these days of being watched and separated from my boys while they are at their own viewings, I've had what little comfort I can derive from blocking what I can from Posy. It's hard to cede that responsibility to Gale (even when I know that he will guard her every bit as zealously as I would). I'm left with nothing to do. The crowd has pressed in, and I'm left out of reach of any of my children. It bothers me more than it should. They are right there. I can see them. If I nudged Madge or Ari or Prim a little bit, I could reach them. But, it still feels wrong. This could be very bad today, and I want to be able to comfort my babies. Then, it occurs to me how much trouble that could cause for us all. If I tried to turn Posy's head or bury Vick's or Rory's in my side. If I tried to pull Gale's eyes away from the screen. It's not just somewhat lax Peacekeepers watching us any more. And I vaguely wonder if Gale maneuvered us into this configuration on purpose. I'm supposed to be the mother.

It's making me antsy, and I find my thoughts flitting in a most scattered manner as the violence that always accompanies a feast plays itself out on the screen.

It suddenly occurs to me that the Mayor's daughter has no Capital follower. I don't remember a single person pointing to her instead of Gale when they went looking for the tribute's friends. I wonder briefly how someone in such a position of prominence can manage to be so invisible.

Ari Everdeen is muttering under her breath seemingly everything she has every learned about healing. There is a steady stream of suggestions for all of the minor injuries that are shown as the screen jumps from tribute to tribute where they wait for the altercation to begin. She mentions options for the boy's leg, talks about malnourishment in reference to the girl from 5. Anything and everything except for her daughter on the screen or the one standing in front of her. She's not paying the least bit of attention to either of them, and I find myself understanding why my own children have been so adamant about keeping Prim company during the Games.

I wince as the girl from 2 has Katniss pinned to the ground. Posy is crying and asking Gale to make her stop, and it's killing me that there is nothing that I can do for either of them. Vick has leaned back against Madge, and her arm is wrapped over his shoulder hugging him to her - that should be me. My eyes flit over Prim's hand holding tightly on to Madge's and focus on the other that Rory has reached back to hold. He doesn't look back at her. He's focused on the screen being stoic in imitation of his older brother.

And Katniss is running away with blood dripping from her head because the boy from 11 decided he owed her a debt. And the boy from 2, one of the Careers that we always write off as heartless, has stopped playing their Game altogether. He isn't pressing his advantage over the injured Katniss or fighting the boy from 11 who took his supplies. He's holding the girl that was his District partner – rocking back and forth and begging her not to leave him even after she's already gone.

They dismiss us as the screen jumps from person to person as if it can't determine where it is safe to settle. They have to show something, but what can they focus on? There's someone not following their rules nearly everywhere that they turn. The crowd doesn't seem to want to move. The majority of the people in the District are still watching the screens. Whether it's to see if Katniss makes it back okay or because of the massive shift in the tone of the Games that we've all just witnessed, it's hard to say. But it's making the Peacekeepers nervous. And nervous Peacekeepers issue threats.


	22. Chapter 22

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I don't believe a single citizen of District 12 did anything with their Sunday other than stare at their televisions watching for momentary glimpses of our unconscious tributes. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm projecting because that was what was happening in my own home. After the difficulties they had dispersing the crowd after the feast, every person in District 12 was banned from the square when not present for officially sanctioned purposes (required viewing hours). Or that could have been the initial response to the vigil keeping from the previous night. Either way, that announcement caused the breakup of the small group of children that I'm certain Madge would have joined with for another night of sitting and waiting for Katniss to wake. I overhead a semi whispered "It's okay, Mama says she doesn't think she'll wake up until tomorrow" that had my daughter nodding and agreeing to leave the little blond that she had been looking like she was about to follow home. In a way, the Peacekeepers announcement did me a favor. It got Madge home where she at least got a little bit of sleep drifting off between fits of watching.

Monday didn't offer much in the way of what the Capital usually refers to as "entertainment" from our District tributes. Mostly, there was a lot of sleeping. The way that boy watched her sleeping hit at me in a way that nothing in the Games has done for a long time. It's almost nice to have let go of the worry over managing the way I have – it lets me actually see the Games again. That doesn't sound like the best thing to have happen; the Games aren't something that anyone should have to see. But, they exist. And I'm back to reacting to them the way any normal person should. I've been clinically detached for so long that it's a bit of a shock to my system, but in the course of a few days I've gone from detached to worried to giving in to the inevitable. And now that boy on the screen has brought me back to really, truly caring. I've kept that same watch over the woman I love too many times for it not to have. Counting her breaths, watching her chest rise and fall, hoping that she is better when she wakes, reminding myself that she is still alive – worrying that the morphling has been too much this time, feeling helpless as I can think of nothing to do to help. He's showing a quiet sort of desperation with which I'm all too familiar.

On Tuesday, he starts talking. It's difficult not to get drawn in by the boy on the screen now that I've given up on focusing on the implications. He has a gift for holding an audience's attention even when he isn't focused on the audience. I'm sure that somewhere (in the back of his mind) he realizes that they are being watched – scrutinized even – but he is far too focused on her and what he is trying to tell her for the awkwardness that could creep in to his speech over that awareness to ever make an appearance. He's an artist – rendering a picture of his first glimpses of the girl with such clarity that I can see the phantom image flickering in front of my eyes. It's similar, in a way, to what I feel when I listen to my daughter practicing her piano in unguarded moments. She's sitting with her eyes closed, listening, and the smile that drifts across her features tells me she's seeing the same image I am – only likely with much more clarity.

The delivery of dinner that comes after his words tells me much about the mood of Panem as a whole. I know that there was a collection in District 12 for sponsoring our tributes (an unheard of occasion that sent me into a tailspin when I first heard of it), but there is no way the entirety of our District could have skipped enough meals to afford what I see on the screen in front of me. The Capital paid for this. The citizens of the Capital are every bit as enthralled as the rest of us. _They_ must be going insane. For once, I relish the fact that something must be unsettling them.

Madge is tearing up beside me. Her eyes remain closed, but she is smiling softly in such a way that there is no reason for me to misinterpret her tears as anything negative.

"Madge?" I question because I may know that these are what my wife once called "happy tears," but I can't figure out what it is that has caused them.

"They haven't broken him," she explains to me as her eyes open with an expression that radiates some sort of cross of contentment and sincere relief. Her eyes have focused somewhere over my shoulder, and I suspect she's talking to herself as much as to me. "It is true," her voice is barely above a whisper and I'm not sure if it's because she is semi talking to herself or if it's because she feels it's the appropriate level of volume for the nearly reverent tone that she's using.

"It's all true. They can't break you if you don't let them. You just have to have something that matters. You just have to have something to hold on to that is more important than anything they can do to you." She trails off, and her eyes refocus on mine. She moves over to hug me and whispers even more softly "They are going to be in so much trouble, but it is all going to be okay in the end."

She leaves the room, and I turn to watch her go wondering what it is that I've just witnessed. It is then that I realize that the item over my shoulder that she was looking at was the picture of her grandmother that hangs on our wall.

Days ago I would have been panicking, but now, now I think I'm beginning to understand.


	23. Chapter 23

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

I cannot pretend to know what it is like to be trapped in the Games. I do not know what it does to you to spend day after day enclosed in that arena – separated from everyone and everything you care about with a slim piece of hope dangled always just beyond the edge of your reach promising that you can return to them if you will only drop everything you've ever known about right and wrong and act in ways that you would, once upon a time, have declared unconscionable. I don't know what it is like to be cut off from all human interactions save for those in which someone may, at any moment, attempt to kill you. I don't know what it is like to be constantly on edge, too afraid to rest because of what or who may be lurking, waiting for an opportunity to strike. I do not know what it is like to be afforded the unexpected gift of someone you can trust in the midst of such a situation. I do not know what it does to your heart to let down your guard and allow that person in. And I do not know what it is like to think that the security, the solace of having that person with you has been taken away.

What I do know is what it is like to hear the sound of the sirens going off at the mines. I know what it is like to have your heart skip at the realization that someone precious to you may be in danger. I know the desperation of rushing to be as close to them as you can even while knowing that if the thoughts plaguing the back of your mind are accurate that you are already too late. I know what it is like to feel helpless. I know what it is like to have your eyes flitting from place to place so quickly that the only piece of what you are seeing that registers is the fact that you are not seeing the only thing that you want to see. I know what it is to be suddenly seized by a terror that extinguishes all other thought. I know what it is to have flashes of your world without that precious person speeding through your mind so quickly that the only thing that is clear is how much it hurts to picture a gap in your life where they should be.

That is why I recognize what I see from Katniss as she searches for the boy after he fails to respond to her signal. I have the advantage of the screen in front of me that tells me he is fine. I have the understanding that the running water has blocked the sound of her call from reaching him. I know that the boy from 2 is too far away for the noises she is making to draw his attention. She knows none of this. She only knows a panicked fear of loss. I can see it in her expression. I can hear it in her voice. I can feel it in the way she disregards all her careful training of how to walk in silence as she thinks of nothing but finding him. For those few moments, there is no room for anything else but him. There is nothing in her mind but finding him. There is nothing in her head but making sure of his safety. She covers quickly with anger. She hides her relief in snappish words, but I know what I saw.

And so does Gale.

The Capital people and cameras have trailed my son with a quiet intensity as the Games seemingly wind down in front of us. They seem to have little time for any of the rest of us. The lenses don't seem to turn in any of our directions. I don't think that I am paranoid. I don't think that I am imaging it. They are focused on him anytime something happens. They are also focused on him when nothing changes for hours at a time. Nothing seems to be able to distract their focus – not even the younger children's displays of pandering for their attention. The grating woman with her silver tattoos is always finding reasons to place herself close to him.

"How do you feel about your cousin sharing that sleeping bag?" She asked leaning into Gale and winking in a manner that looked positively indecent. She was only momentarily deflected by Vick's semi-innocent observation that "Doesn't everybody share beds?" Posy attempted to begin a dissertation on why she likes me to hug her when she sleeps when there is snow, but the woman (for the first time) cut her off before she could get going. She only wants answers from Gale. Whether she has taken it as a personal affront that he has been so uncommunicative and has made it her personal mission to try to draw him out or if there is some sort of narrative agenda that she is trying to trick him into becoming fodder for, I am unclear. I only know that I resent every word that she directs at my child.

He remains aloof. He does not allow them any satisfaction in their attempts to force confessions and responses. He refuses to be part of their Games in the only manner left to him in which he can do so. He doesn't let them have _him_.

In consequence, I don't get to have him either. Those times when we could slip into the kitchen for a few moments of whispered conversation are gone. There is only watching him while we are all being watched. There is only knowing how he must be feeling without being able to console or advise or burden share.

He dislikes change with intensity. He dislikes not being in control with everything in him. And both are being relentlessly shoved in his face during every waking moment. He can't show anger. He can't show grief. He must be so careful not to display anything that I don't even know if he is being allowed time to acknowledge to himself what he is feeling.

One of his own is having her life pulled apart on that screen, and I know how Gale feels about things that are his. He looks out for them. He protects them. She still may die, and he can't stop it. She's changing from the person that he knew, and he can't do anything but watch.

The reality that even if she does somehow come back, then she won't be untouched by everything that has happened is sinking in. They are blocking him from talking about it. They are blocking him from being comforted. They are even blocking him from escaping to think.

The hope that she will come back (even as changed as she will be) is rising with every other tribute that falls by the wayside. That just leaves more room for disappointment – further for him to fall if she doesn't survive.

I worry that we can't talk about any of this. I worry about what he is holding inside, and I worry about what it will do to him to not be able to express it. Everything about the way the Capital has blocked us from expressing what we are thinking inside our own home is driving me slowly insane.

Unreasonably, this is what makes me the most angry of all the things I have to choose from among the things the Capital has inflicted upon us over the course of my life. I resent this intrusion. I am boiling inside over this gap that they have created between me and my child. I can see nothing of the official adult that I am supposed to see now when I look at him – I see only my little boy. He is hurting, and I cannot offer him comfort. He is hurting, and he cannot show it. He is hurting, and they are watching with unblinking camera eyes to try to exploit it for their own entertainment. My mother always taught that hate is not a word to be used lightly, and I've never made a habit of using it before. But now, in this moment, I hate these people that have come and disrupted our lives with a passion that I didn't know I was capable of feeling.


	24. Chapter 24

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

My calm, collected daughter nearly jumped out of her skin when the mutts first appeared chasing after the boy from 2. The truth be told – I was startled myself. Even after years upon years of viewing these Games (or maybe because of all of that viewing), I didn't expect them to be coming. The three remaining tributes were already making their way toward each other. Their confrontation was inevitable, but that apparently wasn't enough for the Gamemakers. They needed something more dramatic to secure the attention of their audience - enter the genetically engineered doglike creatures. At first I thought that was the only reason for their appearance, then I realized that they were more herding than attacking the boy on the screen. He was too spooked to realize this (and I cannot blame him at all), but I would have been willing to wager a hefty sum that those Gamemaker controlled monstrosities wouldn't attack in earnest until all three remaining tributes were together. As I have observed before, they don't out and out chose the winner, but they have no problem shifting the odds when they feel like it. Instead of two on one with the unfavored (despite their popularity among the Capital audience) having the advantage, their odds are now two on one on a multitude of creatures with which Katniss's weapon will provide her only minimal assistance.

That was as far as I got in my thoughts and analysis before I was interrupted by Madge's startled gasp and cry of indignation as it drowned out the commotion on the television.

"How could they!" Her voice was loud enough that it very nearly echoed in the confines of our always so quiet home. It is not like her to make such an outburst. While I was originally surprised by the appearance of the mutts, I didn't feel it warranted such an extreme response on her part. I looked at her intending to question her, but she was far too focused on the television screen to notice anything else. Her eyes were wide in horror, she was nearly shaking with anger, and she was muttering only minimally comprehensible phrases in a tone of voice that I am pleased to say has never been directed at me (even on the worst days of our relationship).

The few words that I caught questioned the Gamemakers' level of mental health (or lack thereof), the circumstances leading to their birth, their basic humanity (or lack thereof), and whether or not they possessed such things as souls (there were several words included in the tirade that I was unaware that my teenager knew, and there were a few that I wasn't certain of the meaning of but I pieced together the gist of it all from context).

I was still torn between being appalled at the sudden display of open hostility (and the rather lengthy list of intense vocabulary) from Madge and being confused as to what had caused this seeming meltdown in the first place when my attention was diverted by the sound of stumbling feet making their way down the stairs. Madge's outburst had been loud enough to bring my wife to investigate the situation.

My wife entered the room before I could go to assist her. Her mother's presence drew Madge's attention from the television for the first time since the mutts had appeared.

"Mama," she cried rushing to her side and quickly embracing her before pulling her gently to the sofa. Her voice was softer and pained as she told her. "They're using the dead."

I looked closely at the creatures as she explained the situation in whispers to her mother, and I finally saw what it was that she had noticed. Each mutt was labeled with a District number. Each mutt had the coloring of one of the deceased tributes. And the eyes . . .

I've never seen anything like it. As if the humiliations and tortures that they inflict upon the Districts are not bad enough, they had to go and use the dead tributes to further whatever agenda they are now pursuing in these Games. I understand why my daughter reacted the way that she did. They have crossed a line with this set of mutts. Maybe it doesn't seem like anything to be upset over – after all, we see so many awful things done to the living. But there is something different about the level of disrespect apparent in this action. There's something chilling in the implication they are presenting that even in death you are not safe from their machinations and control.

Madge has worn out the first edge of her anger and has settled into a silence curled up beside her mother on our sofa. I can't remember the last time that I saw my wife voluntarily watch the Games. It's irrelevant to what is taking place before us, but it strikes me nonetheless.

The mutts are right behind the running boy as he breaks into the clearing around the Cornucopia. Katniss discovers the gift of body armor he received before she registers that he is being followed by something.

Madge catches my eye and beckons me over. I slide onto the sofa beside her, and my wife's hand soon finds mine and grasps it on Madge's lap. We sit together cuddling our daughter between us as if she were a much smaller child. Tonight, I think we are allowed.

There are horrors playing out before us on the television – ones that by the allowance of their existence reflect a deeper horror that lies in the truth of what our world is. They show no inclination for ending quickly. The night promises to be long and drawn out. It will be unpleasant. It will be disturbing. Letting its reality touch us may leave scars, but we're going to face it anyway. Wishing it over quickly will not change the fact that it has happened. Brokering with our consciences that letting it happen unobstructed will somehow prevent other, broader evils will not mitigate its wrongness in any way. I am ready to face that now – my daughter and my wife taught me how.

So, we will sit here united and face all that is coming together.


	25. Chapter 25

Disclaimer: _The Hunger Games_ isn't mine.

_They_ are still in my home, and I am still seething. I can't look at one of my children without seeing something _they_ have taken, something _they_ may have destroyed.

I don't think Posy will ever be able to stand being near a dog again. It's not that she has encountered them often, but the select few tied in Merchant yards have garnered her attention when we've passed. She's always asked why she cannot go and pet them. I suspect that desire will not reappear. It's something that the Gamemakers have stolen from her – a piece of her innocence, a simple joy that they have turned into one more nightmare. (The way that boy suffered – I may have nightmares myself.) She sobbed and fought and kept demanding to know if Katniss was being eaten. When I finally got her to sleep, she did so only bursts – waking up often in tears or screaming wanting myself or Gale to reassure her that she was safe and neither Vick nor Rory had been "got by the big dogs" while she slept.

_That woman_ has no idea how close she came to losing her front teeth to my fist when I returned to the room after my third time of resettling Posy. "Excellent camera work for the lack of lighting," she commented as if a child wasn't being torn to pieces while another one bled and another one nearly froze in front of her face. "It really makes it look as if it's right in the room." Gale's hand on my arm pulled me back to the land of thinking before doing. Part of me wishes he hadn't. Part of me wishes that just once I could force a hearty dose of reality into one of those pathetically shallow little Capital lives. The part of me (and it's the largest part by far) that is invested in my children's safety over anything as insignificant as my pride and temper is grateful Gale had the presence of mind to intercede.

Then, there's Vick. I leveraged him away from the awfulness on the screen with the insistence that it was bedtime. It got him away from the television. It got him away from the people still camping out in our living room. It didn't get my sweet, sensitive child away from the memory of everything he had seen. He didn't sleep all night. He lay in his bed quietly crying. "Gale needs you more," he would stubbornly insist whenever I peeked in on him. Except for once, once he reached up and grabbed my hand and asked me "Why?"

"Why, Mama, why do they like to watch them hurt?"

Why indeed, my baby. I had no answers for him. There are no answers to give. There are no explanations to offer. There is no way to make him understand because there is nothing there that can be understood. There is nothing reasonable in the knowledge that those children he sees suffering are doing so in some twisted sort of penance for something that occurred before their grandparents were even alive. So, my baby nursed his fear, his confusion, and his sadness all alone in the dark because he didn't want his brother left alone with the people who didn't understand "that Katniss is really real, and so are all the others." I'm so very, very afraid that he's lost his optimism to these Games. Some people call that growing up; I call it the loss of something vital to who my child has always been.

I don't know yet what they've taken from Rory. He's so trying to be Gale in everything that he can. My practical little boy who retained his pride as I hustled him away from the television to bed by muttering to himself about "no good to anyone half asleep" and was promptly out like a light (or, at least, pretending to be so that Vick could have his privacy). I want so badly for him to know that it's okay to be himself – that he doesn't have to take on extra burdens, and yet I can't help but be proud at his willingness even while I struggle with my anger over the possibility of him losing his childhood like his brother. I hate the way the presence of these people in our home has pushed him into thinking he needs to be more mature to help to shield Gale. I hate that I'm watching him learn to play these people when this isn't a game (and he shouldn't be confronting them at all).

My heart has broken for Gale more times this night than should be humanly possible. Time seems to stretch out every moment that ticks by as he watches silently, unflappable, trying so hard to give no reactions that his watchers can use as he stares at his best friend on the screen. I watch him wondering what he is thinking, being reasonably certain that I know. Realizing that she is so close, knowing that it could still go all wrong, listening to the comments of the people from the Capital and worrying that he is becoming like them since he knew he wanted all the others to die to clear the path for her to come home, desperately wishing that everything could just go back to his normal, knowing deep down that the girl he watched leave on the train won't be the one who comes back, planning ways that he can fix that, thinking of ways to put everything back the way that it was, and trying so hard to find something, anything about this situation that he can control – and finding only his refusal to let those watching into his head as the only thing to be found.

After the seemingly endless night, dawn brings a change in the speed of the Game that may be only in my imagination. The boy from 2 is finally no longer suffering. The Gamemakers are refusing to keep their word. My younger children are stumbling into the living room. Katniss and Peeta are fighting with each other – not to kill the other, but over who has to go home and live with being the survivor. Our unwelcome houseguests are so entranced (even our silver painted vulture) that they have forgotten to pay attention to us at all. Gale is looking at me with all of his defenses dropped with eyes that are pleading and lost and hurt and confused, and I'm squeezing his hand in response. Katniss is pulling out those poisonous berries, and Posy is wide eyed in my lap not knowing what questions to ask. The tributes from 12 are standing defiantly together, and Vick is burying his head in Gale's shoulder. They're pushing the Capital into a corner. They can have two Victors or none at all, and Rory is pushing himself in between his brother and me on the sofa. And the same announcer's voice I have heard all my life (but never sounding so out of breath and distraught) is telling them to stop. They've won, and my family is squeezed together holding each other and holding our breath not sure whether it is really over or not.

The screen flashes to the seal and goes blank. The Capital people break out of their entranced spell and turn to look at us. And I know it's not really over at all.

* * *

><p>Author's Note: This felt like the appropriate place for this story to draw to a close. Thank you to everyone who chose to stick with it until the end. Thank you, especially, to everyone who took the time to leave me their thoughts and reactions. Your words meant more to me than you can ever know<p> 


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